

















The 

Folk of Furry Farm 


The Romance of an Irish Village 


By 


K. F. Purdon 

n 


With an Introduction by 

George A. Birmingham •/ 


G. P. Putnam’s Sons 
New York and London 
Gbe IftnicKerbocfter press 
1914 




Copyright, 19x4 

BY 

G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS 


* f . o 

MAY -2 191413 


Ube Iknfcfeerbocfeer press, iRew Korfe 

'©CI.A369931* 

*- 02 . ^ 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 

Introduction v 

CHAPTER 

I. — The Furry Farm . . . . i 

II. — The Game Leg 37 

III. — The “ Rest of Him ” . . . .57 

IV. — A Daylight Ghost . . . .105 

V. — Matchmaking in Ardenoo . .146 

VI. — A Settled Girl 182 

VII. — An American Visitor . . . 226 

VIII. — Rosy at Furry Farm . . . 278 


IX. — Comrade Children at the Furry Farm 314 


INTRODUCTION 


WITH A NOTE ON THE PEOPLE OF THE PLAIN 

By George A. Birmingham 

It is the duty of the writer of an introduction, 
as I understand his position, to provide what Mr. 
Bernard Shaw calls “First Aid to Critics.” That 
is to say, it is my business to explain the position 
which Miss Purdon holds in modern Irish literature 
and to say why her work is interesting and in what 
respects it is good. I do not feel in the least in- 
clined to point out the weaknesses of her writing. 
For one thing, there are plenty of reviewers in the 
world who will do that, and apparently take pleas- 
ure in doing it. For another, although like all 
human works this book is imperfect, I have enjoyed 
reading it and have been too much interested in 
what I read to be impressed by the faults which 
must, no doubt, exist. I shall, therefore, provide 
aid only to the kinder sort of critic, to him who is 


VI 


Introduction 


sufficiently wise to appreciate Miss Purdon’s work. 
I shall save him a lot of trouble, for, if he reads this 
introduction, he will be able to allow himself to 
enjoy Miss Purdon’s writing without bothering 
himself about what he is to say in his review. I 
shall tell him that. 

The first point about The Folk of Furry Farm 
to which I wish to draw attention is that it is 
written in prose. This may seem to be a common- 
place and obvious kind of fact, but in reality it has 
a certain importance which might very well be 
overlooked. Miss Pur don belongs to the Irish 
Literary Movement, and it has, as yet, produced 
very little prose and less prose fiction. At the 
beginning the movement was inspired by the 
hero tales of ancient Ireland and the mysticism 
in which they are enveloped. These tales came 
down from the days of paganism, and paganism, 
as everybody who appreciates the Irish Literary 
Movement knows, was a wonderful and romantic 
thing, far superior to the dowdy materialism of 
Christianity. Also, our literary movement fed 
a good deal upon fairies. Who could write in 
ordinary prose about subjects so fascinating as 
folk-lore and fairies? Mr. Yeats and his followers 
could not. They wrote mystic and, as time went 


Introduction 


Vll 


on, rather incomprehensible verse. With them 
were a number of what we may call politically 
patriotic poets like “Ethna Carbery” and Miss 
Milligan. They were easier to understand, but 
were still a long way from the commonplace things 
of ordinary life. Then came another band of 
writers, headed by Mr. Padraic Colm, who gave us 
splendid poems about ploughers and drovers, but 
still felt it necessary to drag in Dana and Wotan 
occasionally. Mr. James Stephens, in his verse, 
went a step beyond them, for his is the genius 
which can make the back street beautiful. Poetry 
can get no nearer to realism than James Stephens 
and Joseph Campbell. 

Meanwhile the Abbey Theatre had been founded 
and the energies of many young Irish writers were 
absorbed in composing plays for it. It developed 
in much the same way as the poetry did. At first 
the drama was almost as mystic and far-away as 
the early lyrics. Then came Synge, the greatest of 
all the Abbey Theatre writers, who put a gorgeous 
language into the mouths of rather squalid but in- 
tensely human peasants. The tendency of his fol- 
lowers had been to emphasise the squalidness but to 
leave out the poetry and a good deal of the human 
nature. The lines written by Max Beerbohm about 


Introduction 


viii 

Mr. Masefield might very well be applied to some 
of them : 

A swear word in a village slum 

A simple swear word is to some ; 

To . . . something more. 

In verse and drama alike the mystic has given 
way to the materialist, high poetry to realism. 
But as yet the Irish Literary Revival has produced 
very little ordinary prose literature and hardly 
any fiction. Apart from Lady Gregory’s poetic 
“ Kiltartan ” prose, the best that has been produced 
has generally been of a journalistic kind. I do 
not mean that it has been journalese, but that it 
has appeared in newspapers and periodicals, and 
has been concerned primarily with questions of 
the day. To mention only two examples, no 
modern work of its kind has been more brilliant 
than the articles in The Homestead written by 
“AE.,” while Mr. Arthur Griffith’s editorials for 
The United Irishman and Sinn Fein are often 
worthy of comparison with the best that came 
from the pen of Mitchel. Of a more permanent 
kind were the critical articles of “John Eglinton,” 
many of them published originally in the now 
defunct Dana . 


Introduction 


IX 


There have been, of course, a number of Irish 
novelists and essayists who have made great 
names for themselves, but they have not drawn 
their inspiration from the movement which pro- 
duced the poets. Mr. George Moore has viewed 
the Irish Literary Revival as a spectator. His 
original inspiration was not from Ireland. Miss 
Somerville and Miss Ross are the successors of 
Lever. No corner of the mantle of Mr. Standish 
O’ Grady has fallen upon them. They would have 
written just the same if there had been no Gaelic 
League, no fairies, and no ancient Irish heroes. 
For Oscar Wilde and Bernard Shaw Ireland can 
claim just the same sort of credit, and no more, as 
she can claim for Sheridan and Goldsmith. Stand- 
ish O’Grady, the father of the whole movement, 
wove historical romances out of incidents in Irish 
history. He has had few or no followers. 

There are signs now that the literary movement, 
having worked from the highest to the most 
materialistic in prose and drama, is going to fol- 
low the natural course of development and express 
itself in prose fiction. Mr. James Stephens, one 
of the most brilliant of our poets, has deserted 
verse and taken, quite suddenly, to novel-writing. 
Already he has earned fame and an assured position. 


X 


Introduction 


I am inclined to think that he is typical of a wide 
change of which Miss Purdon is another example. 
If she had published a book ten or fifteen years 
ago it would probably have been verse. Happily 
this is to-day, and she has found a scope for her 
abilities more suitable to them than poetry. 

I hope that Miss Purdon will not resent being 
called part of a movement. When she has written 
a few more books and read reviews of them she will 
become quite accustomed to this particular kind 
of insult. In reality she holds a position a little 
apart from other Irish authors. Her distinction 
is that she has chosen a new part of the country to 
write about. I do not know exactly where the 
Furry Farm is, but I am inclined to place it some- 
where in the western part of Leinster, in Meath or 
Kildare, on the great plain which fattens cattle 
for the market. Other Irish writers, whether they 
wanted humour, romance, or mysticism, have gone 
to the maritime counties for their material. Gal- 
way, Cork, and Wicklow provide scenes for most 
of the plays which are acted in the Abbey Theatre. 
Some poets write about Donegal, others prefer 
North-East Ulster, and a few brave spirits have 
ventured into the streets and suburbs of Dublin. 
But I cannot remember that any plays or poems of 


Introduction 


xi 


importance have been written about the people of 
the central plain. They are regarded, for some 
reason obscure to me, as unworthy of a place in 
literature. They have, so one would gather, lost 
the virtues of Gaeldom without acquiring the 
sentimental regard for them which rescues Dublin 
from the reproach of “seoninism. ” The accepted 
view of literary Ireland is that the people of Meath 
are as uninteresting as the bullocks which they 
herd. 

Miss Purdon comes to us to prove the contrary. 
A great merit of her work is the fidelity with which 
she reproduces the dialect of the peasants about 
whom she writes. I do not know the western 
Leinster speech myself, but I am certain that Miss 
Purdon deals with it faithfully. She could not — 
no single person could — have invented all the 
phrases and expressions which she has put into 
the mouths of the characters of her stories. We 
have in her book the living tongue spoken by a 
neglected class of Irishmen. I do not say that the 
people of Meath and Kildare have the magic 
glamour of Celtic mysticism. I am no judge of 
such things. I have seldom succeeded in recognis- 
ing it even in places where I know that it must 
be. But Miss Purdon’s people have imagination. 


Xll 


Introduction 


How else would they say of a lonely place, “There 
wasn’t a neighbour within the bawl of an ass of it ” ? 
If they had not humour, they would not think of 
saying, “His pockets would be like sideboards, 
the way he’d have them stuck out with meat and 
eggs and so on.” The men who use expressions 
like these cannot possibly be stupid, and Miss 
Purdon makes them very real. They are, as their 
speech shows, of a type different from that of the 
peasantry of the Atlantic coast. Perhaps they 
have no appeal to make to poets; but they 
must certainly be capable of providing material 
for many plays and novels. Miss Purdon has 
discovered a new country, found a fresh subject 
for the pens of Irish writers. 


G. A. B. 


The 

Folk of Furry Farm 



The Folk of Furry Farm 


CHAPTER I 

THE FURRY FARM 

There isn’t one now at Ardenoo that could tell you 
rightly about the Heffernans, or when the first of 
the name had come in upon the Furry Farm. 
People would remark that they were “the oldest 
standards about the place, and had been there 
during secula . ” And some said that in the real 
old ancient times, it was Heffernans that had 
owned the whole countryside, and had been great 
high Quality then, until they were turned out of 
their home, through their being Catholics. Of 
course such things did occur, but not often. There 
would not be many willing to be mixed up in such 
dirty work. And, moreover, those that came in on 
land in that way, mostly always did it to keep their 
place warm for whoever had had to quit out. 


2 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

There’s a lot of nature in people, more than they 
get credit for. That’s how things don’t turn out 
as bad as you might expect very often. And of 
course along with all, there’s a great satisfaction 
in getting the better of the law. 

It’s likely some friend of the Heffernans had 
stood to them in this way, when they had had to 
leave, and had just held the land for them, till they 
could slip back upon it again. But they had never 
said how it was. A queer, silent sort they were 
ever and always, that would never have much talk 
out of them about anything that would be going 
on, let alone about themselves. 

But however it came to pass, at the time I am 
going to tell you about, there was nothing left 
of what had been once a very great fine kind of a 
place, only a bit of a ruined house, like, with the 
remains of a roof made of slabs of bog-oak over 
part of it, and it all reducing away under the 
weather. 

Whatever it used to be, the Heffernans I knew 
would just fasten a calf in it, maybe, or put a goose 
to hatch there the way her mind wouldn’t be riz, 
it being a very quiet corner. And it was necessary 
to have every such little business as that going on 
at the Furry Farm, if you wanted to be able even 


3 


The Furry Farm 

to pay the rent, let alone live yourself out of the 
land. For the Heffernans had to pay rent now, 
as well as another ; and for land that was no great 
shakes, being very poor and thin. The best of it 
they never got back at all. 

Betimes you’d hear it remarked in Ardenoo, how 
that they and their land were well matched. For 
if some of their bottom-land was sour, so was the 
Heffernan temper; and they could be as crabbed 
and contrary in their ways as the furze that was 
bristling over their own hills. And in another 
thing they were like their farm. Whatever treat- 
ment they got, that’s what they’d give. If you 
acted well by a Heffernan, they’d do the same by 
you; but they’d never pass over a bad turn; and, 
troth! there’s more than the Heffernans of the 
opinion that it’s only a fool that forgets! And so 
by their land. Hungry as it was, it would always 
return some sort of a crop, in proportion to the way 
it was tilled and manured. But it and its owners 
weren’t much to look at; you had to know them 
well, before you could find out the good there was 
in them. 

In the course of time, there was a Heffernan in 
the Furry Farm, Michael by name, that was what 
you might call a chip of the old block. Quiet-going 


4 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

in himself, he was; silent and fond of industering; 
and a bit near about money, on the top of all. 
You’ll often see people like that; as if them that 
worked hard had no time for enjoying what they 
make ; whereas people that are poor and through- 
other will spend their last penny twice as free as 
what one like Heffernan would spend his first. 
And what’s more, they’ll get far better value out 
of it, too. 

But that was just Michael’s way of going on; 
he’d sooner be putting up money in the old stocking 
than spending it on an odd spree. And he had 
every right to please himself. For he had no one 
else, barring a sister, older than himself, and twice 
as curious in her ways, and she with a tongue in 
her head as long as to-day and to-morrow. Many’s 
the time she let Mickey feel the length and breadth 
of it, but he had the fashion of never making her 
an answer, no matter what. It was the best of 
his play to say nothing. A man scarce ever can 
get the better of a woman that starts to give him a 
tongue-thrashing. Sure they do have great prac- 
tice at it; and small blame to them! isn’t it the 
only thing they can do, to have their say out? 
Heffernan held his whisht in particular, because 
he knew well what would happen. The sister 


5 


The Furry Farm 

would get that outrageous mad with him, when 
she couldn’t make him as angry as herself, that 
she’d have to quit out; go away for weeks at a 
time she would, to friends in Dublin. Then poor 
Mickey would have great ease. 

As far as she was concerned, that is, for he’d 
have the place to himself. But he never slackened 
on the work, only would be at it, early and late; 
so much so, that the people would be wondering 
why he’d bother his head with it all. 

“And he ’ithout one in it, only himself!” they’d 
cry; “and no signs of he to be looking out for a 
wife, either! A middling stale boy poor Mickey 
should be, at this present!” 

That was true enough, and along with that, he 
was no great beauty, to look at. The sister was 
worse again; as ugly as if she was bespoke. Still 
in all, she never gave up all hopes of she getting 
married. But that’s the way with a-many a one, 
as well as Julia Heffeman. 

Well, there came the day that she riz a shocking 
row all out with Mickey; and for what, neither 
man nor mortal could tell; no, nor Julia herself, 
let alone Mickey. Off with her, to some third or 
fourth cousin of theirs in England. 

“Luck’s a king and Luck’s a beggar!” says she; 


6 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

“and a body never knows whose flure it’s waiting 
on, for you!” 

“Sure it’s leaving it behind you, maybe, you 
are! going off that-a-away in such a hurry!” says 
Mickey. 

Not but what he was praying for she to be gone. 
But he knew if he let on to her how anxious he was 
to get shut of her, the sorra toe she’d stir. The 
same as if you were driving a pig. You must pull 
it back, if you want it to go on. 

“Leaving it behind me, indeed!” says she; 
“no, but it’s hardship and a dog’s life I’m leaving! 
I’ve stopped here long enough, slaving the skin 
off me bones for ye!” says she. 

So Mickey said no more, only drove her off him- 
self on the side-car to the train, with her box; and 
when she was gone, “A good riddance of bad rub- 
bish!” said Mickey to himself; and was getting up 
on the car again, when he perceived on the plat- 
form, as if he was after getting off the train, a 
young boy, a sort of a cousin of his own, by the 
name of Art Heffeman. 

They passed the time of day, of course, and 
then had some further discourse, and it appeared 
that Art was out of a job. He had no means, no, 
nor a home; not one belonging to him any nearer 


7 


The Furry Farm 

nor Mickey. All his people were either gone to 
America, or to the old churchyard of Clough-na- 
Rinka, he said. 

So Mickey then preffered him the chance of 
coming back with him to the Furry Farm for a bit, 
till he’d have time to look about him. 

“I don’t mind if I do,” says Art; “but if I stop 
awhile and work about the place, what will you do 
for me in the way of payment?” 

“Duck’s wages; the run of your bill,” says 
Mickey. 

“Throw in a shuit of clothes and a pair of 
brogues, twice a year; and the grass of the little 
heifer I have, ” says Art, “and I don’t mind trying 
how we’ll get on for a bit. ” 

Mickey agreed to that. He was at a short at 
that time, with Julia gone off, and no one likely 
at hand to do the work about the house, let alone 
the farm. And Art was well worthy of what he got. 
He was a smart, willing boy; able and ready to put 
his hand to whatever was required to be done about 
the whole place. And Mickey was contented with 
him. By this plan, he hadn’t to pay out money in 
wages; a thing he never had any wish for was, to 
part money. 

It all went on very well. Art worked early and 


8 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

late, and was always agreeable and civil-spoken; 
so that the two of them, Heffernans both, appeared 
always to be the best of friends. And the people 
began saying among themselves, that Art was as 
apt as not to be coming in on the Furry Farm, when 
the present man would be done with it. That 
would be natural enough. But the thing turned 
out very different, in the heel of the hunt, from 
what any one was laying out then about the 
Heffernans. 

There chanced to be a poor widow woman living 
in a little bit of a house that was edged in upon the 
Furry Farm. She paid some small trifle of rent 
to Mickey for it and a garden there was to it. She 
had no one in this living world in it only herself 
and a young slip of a girl, a daughter of hers. 

In a case of the kind, you’ll mostly always find 
there will be some one or other ready to do the lone 
woman a good turn, such as the lend of a hand in 
the getting of the turf, and the planting of the 
potatoes, and so and so on. And Heffernan that 
was always counted to be a good enough neighbour, 
in his own way, would say to Art of an evening, 
“When you have this, that, and th’other done 
. . . the pigs fed, and the horses made up for the 
night, and water and turf left into the kitchen, 


9 


The Furry Farm 

you may’s well take and mosey off down to the 
Widdah Rafferty’s, and see does she want a hand 
with anything there.” 

“All right!” Art would cry, he being, as I said, 
a very willing, handy boy, ready for any job as 
soon as he’d have the one in hand completed. So 
off he’d go; and Mickey would sit down in the 
chimney-corner, and light his pipe, and swell him- 
self out with the satisfaction of thinking how that 
the poor widdah’s work was getting done, and still 
he to be at no loss in life about it. 

This went on for some time, till Heffernan 
began to take notice how that Art appeared to 
be getting more and more anxious for his evening 
job. 

He thought this over for a while, and then says 
he to Art: “You’re in a tearing hurry to-night 
to get all done,” he says ; “ and to be off from about 
the place, ” says he; “I doubt did you take time to 
more than half milk them cows ! ” he says. 

“The cows is right enough!” says Art, and he 
scrubbing away at himself with a lump of yellow 
soap, and pumping water over himself till you’d 
think he wanted to flood the yard. 

“And where’s the sense in going to all that 
nicety?” says Mickey, “and you about planting 


10 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

praties! washing your hands and face, no less, as 
if it was a Sundah morning!” 

Art got very red, but he made Mickey no answer, 
nor never did. He just put the spade on his 
shoulder, and h-away with him to the Widdah 
Rafferty’s. 

When he came back that night, “I dunno in 
this earthly world what you do be at, at all at 
all,” says Mickey to him, “but it appears as if 
your whole illemint was for Rafferty’s and spend- 
ing your time doing the work there. A body would 
think that the girl there should be middling sizeable 
and strong by this, and able to do her share of 
whatever small matter of business they’d have in 
a place of the kind, and for they to not be looking 
for so much assistance. It was another thing al- 
together, while she was a child!” 

Thinks Art to himself, “It was, so!” and out 
loud says he, “I never do go in it, only when the 
day’s work here is over. ” 

This vexed Mickey ; for wasn’t it as much as to 
say, up to his face, that he begrudged the widdah 
woman what Art did for her; whereas he had no 
objections in life to it, as long as his own business 
wasn’t interfered with. There’s plenty of that 
kind of good-nature in the world ; the same as the 


The Furry Farm 


ii 


way people have of giving away things they can’t 
use themselves, and then they expect great praise 
for doing what costs them nothing. But sure, 
you mightn’t expect too much from the likes of 
Heffernan. 

He said no more then, only the very next evening 
a while after Art had quit off to Rafferty’s didn’t 
Mickey make up his mind to take a waddle off 
there himself, and see what was going on. 

“An’ a fine evening it is, too,” he says to himself, 
quite cheerful-like; “and the ground in the finest 
of order for getting in the spuds. ” 1 

For it was one of those long, clear spring’s days, 
when the birds are just beginning to tune up, and 
you can imagine to see a growth in the grass, and 
a change taking place upon the trees and hedges, 
as if some one was hanging veils of purple and green 
between you and them. But the sorra leaf is out 
on them yet! There’s nothing to be seen only 
bare branches, and the sting of winter is in the 
wind still. The days does be long and bright, 
so much so that a body is apt to imagine that the 
hard weather is all gone away, and that there’s to 
be nothing only what’s warm and pleasant from 
that out. And still in all, it’s the lonesomest time, 


1 Potatoes. 


12 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

and the time you’ll fret the most, of the whole year. 

Heffeman had none of these things in his mind, 
and he making his way along to the Widdah 
Rafferty’s; only planning he was how to get up 
a-nigh it, without he to be seen himself. 

It was along a bit of a boreen 1 the house was; 
and as Mickey came within sight of it, “I see no 
signs of work to be doing presently in this garden ! ” 
says he, and he craning his neck, and making him- 
self as small as he could. And what he was after 
saying was true enough. You could just take 
notice of Art’s spade, stuck up straight in a half- 
dug furrow. But sight nor light of man nor mortal 
there wasn’t to be seen in the garden that Art 
was supposed to be planting. 

On steps Heffeman; and now he begins to hear 
the pleasant little hum-hum of a spinning-wheel. 
The sound of it inside must have deadened the 
noise of his brogues and he going along the rough 
boreen, so as that he was enabled to get up close 
to the house annonst-like, and have a peep at what 
was going on there, without any one knowing he 
was in it at all. 

Well, he looked in, and troth, there was no delay 
on him to do so. He mightn’t have been so 

1 Lane- way. 


13 


The Furry Farm 

cautious. For the people inside were too much 
taken up with themselves and their own goings-on 
to think of looking round for any one else. 

There was the Widdah Rafferty, sitting in the 
chimney-corner at her wheel; but the sorra much 
spinning she was doing, with the way Art had her 
laughing, going on with his antics, himself and the 
daughter. In spite of all the hardship, Mrs. 
Rafferty was a very contented sort of a person, 
never going to meet trouble, as the saying is. 
Laughing at Art she was, and her daughter, Rosy. 
The two of them were sitting on a form, letting on 
to be very hard at work, cutting the seed potatoes, 
and they with a kish 1 upon the floor foreninst them, 
to throw the seed into, according as they’d have 
it ready. 

“That’s never Rosy Rafferty ! ” thinks Heffeman 
to himself. Mickey, as you know, was never one 
to be having much discourse with the neighbours, 
beyond that he’d just pass the time of day with 
them. And that’s how he had never chanced to 
see the girl, no more than that he might meet her 
now and then, going along the road, with her shawl 
over her head, and her eyes on the ground, and she 
with the mother, on their way to Mass. Poor and 


1 Basket. 


14 The Folk of Furry Farm 

all as the Widdah Rafferty was, she made a shift 
someways or other to rear this one child of hers 
very nice and tender. She’d never agree to let her 
go off to dances at the cross-roads, or the like of 
that, without she could be with her, herself. And 
in troth, Rosy Rafferty was as beautiful a young 
creature as ever the sun shone down upon; with 
cheeks like hedge roses, and a pair of big, soft eyes 
that you’d think . . . well, in fact, it would be a 
thing impossible to put down upon paper what 
such a girl looks like. Every eye forms a beauty 
for itself. What delights me, you wouldn’t maybe 
give a thraneen 1 for. But it was given up to Rosy 
that there wasn’t the peel of her in all Ardenoo, in 
the regard of looks, and along with that, she was as 
shy as a filly, and as sweet as a little bird. 

To Mickey Heffeman in especial, that had never 
passed much remarks about any girl, it appeared 
something altogether strange and new, to see the 
bright little face of her, shining there in the dim, 
smoky cabin, like a lovely poppy among the weeds 
of a potato-patch. 

“Mind yer eye!” she was saying to Art, “or 
you’ll cut the hand off of yourself!” 

“Which eye?” says Art, and he with his own 

1 Stem of grass. 


15 


The Furry Farm 

two eyes turned full upon Rosy; and, in troth, 
what a fool he’d be to have them anywhere else; 
“ which eye do ye mane? Is it the eye in me head, 
or the eye in me hand I’m to mind? ” Meaning, of 
course, the bud of the potato he was after cutting. 
“Och, begorra! there’s the knife after slipping on 
me. ...” 

“ There now!” says Rosy, “didn’t I tell you!” 
and with that she turns gashly pale, at the sight 
of the blood. So it was the mother that had to see 
to Art’s wound. She stopped the wheel, and came 
over to look at it. 

“Phoo! what at all!” she says; “sure, that’s 
a thing of nothing! It will be well afore you’re 
twice marrit!” 

“I dunno about that!” says Art, not wanting 
to be done out of Rosy’s commiseration; “there’s 
an imminse pain in it at this present. ” 

“Think as little of that as I do, and there won’t 
be a bother on ye ! ” says the Widdah ; ‘ ‘ and what’s 
this you’re after giving me to bandage it with, 
Rosy? Sure it’s not your good silk hankercher 
that I bought for you, off of Tommy the Crab, 
only last Easter was a twelvemonth! Pshat! girl 
dear, won’t any old polthogue do well enough for 
that cut thumb of Art’s!” 


16 The Folk of Furry Farm 

At this word, Rosy whips the purty little scarf 
into her pocket, and she with cheeks upon her as 
red as scarlet. Well ! to see the look Art gave her! 
If Rosy was a Queen, and she after offering to 
bestow her crown upon him, he couldn’t have ap- 
peared more thankful and delighted. And sure, 
may be after all, a Queen would have one crown 
for using every day, and a good one laid by for 
Sundays as well ; whereas, all the neckerchers that 
Rosy had in this wide world was just that pink 
one the mother had bought her out of Tommy the 
Crab’s basket. 

Well, that all passed off, and when the mother 
was back at her wheel, and Rosy beginning on the 
praties again, says she to Art, Rosy I mean, “You’ll 
cut no more seed here to-night,” she says, “and 
you may’s well be making the road back to Heffer- 
nan’s short now as you’re no more use here,” says 
she. 

“Is ‘that all you want wid me?” says Art; 
“if so, it’s as good for me to be off at wanst, 
as to be staying here, and wearing out me 
welcome!” 

“What a hurry you’re in!” says Rosy then to 
him, and she looking up at him with a laugh in her 
eyes that would coax the birds off of the bushes; 


The Furry Farm 17 

“but sure maybe it's what you’d liefer, to be back 
with Mr. Heffernan beyant. ...” 

“Is it him?” says Art; “troth, it’s him that’s 
the quare ould company to spend an evening wid ! 
and no more diversion in him, nor there’s fur on 
a frog. ...” 

Art was at this time picking the praties out of 
the sack, and handing them to Rosy according as 
she’d be ready to cut them. And this was to help 
on with the work, by the way of; but every time 
he done that, wouldn’t he double his big fist over 
her little fingers and hold them tight, the way he’d 
get her to look up at him; and then they’d both 
take to go laugh. 

“ Look at that, for a Murphy ! ” says Art, holding 
up a big potato ; queer and lumpy and long-shaped 
it was; “isn’t that the very livin’ image of ould 
Mickey himself! See here; the big nose . . . 

and the weeny slit eyes, like pig’s eyes . . . and 
the mouth, like nothing so much as a burst slipper 
. . . ” and that was all true enough. 

“You’ll see likenesses that-a-way often,” says 
the Widdah Rafferty, checking the wheel to join 
in the chat; “ I remimber to see a head of cabbage 
wanst, flat Dutch it was, and it as like ould Father 
Mulhall as could be, the heavens be his bed, I 


i8 


The Folk of Furry Farm 


pray ! very round-about and fat in the body he was. 
And that kittle there, hasn’t it the very appearance 
upon it of ould Tommy the Crab? wid the quare 
pintey little nose of him? And that puts me in 
mind . . . it’s time to be wettin’ the sup of tay. 
Off to the well wid the two of yiz . . . . ” 

Heffernan outside the door heard this, and 
waited for no more, only slipped off, quiet and 
easy, afore any of them had put a stir upon them- 
selves. And that gave him no trouble; for Art 
and Rosy were that taken up with one another, that 
the Widdah had to chastise them more than once, 
afore she could get them to go. So Heffernan was 
able to quit, without being seen by any of them. 

He had heard all he wanted ; ay, and more than 
he liked ! But divil’s cure to him ! what call had he 
to take and go listen to what wasn’t meant for 
him ! He was all in a flutter and he going off home 
with himself. He didn’t like being made fun of; 
and faith! there’s few of us does! But that was 
the least part of what was working in his mind, like 
the wind on a field of ripe oats, twisting and turning 
it hither and over. And the storm that was stir- 
ring Heffernan ’s thoughts was, the look of Rosy 
and she sitting there smiling up at Art. That 
was what had him upset. 


19 


The Furry Farm 

Young boys and girls are a bit too ready to for- 
get that a man’s courting days doesn’t be always 
over, when the grey begins to show in his beard. 
No, in troth! and so by Heffernan. There was a 
warm stir about his heart and he stepping along 
up the boreen, back to his own place, and a feel 
like the spring sunshine came over him, and he 
tried to sing a bit of “The Bunch of Green Rushes, ” 
but sure he hadn’t it right, nor couldn’t remember 
it, he hadn’t heard it those years past. 

When he got back to his own place, what should 
he do, only root out a little cracked looking-glass 
that had been thrown by since God knows when! 
He took it down off of the top of the dresser, and 
he rubbed the dust from it with the sleeve of his 
old coat, and then he went over to the door with it 
in his hand, to get the last of the daylight on it, 
the way he’d see did he look as old all out as he 
knew himself that he was. 

Well, what he seen there was no ways encour- 
aging; so he flings the glass back again, and goes 
over to the chimney-corner, and sits down. It 
was just the end of the day, as I said; the light 
was beginning to fail, and still there was too much 
of it for him to want to shut up the house or go 
light a candle, or that. And it was too cold for 


20 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

a body to care for being outside, unless they had 
some business to attend to. 

So Mickey just sat there, with no one only 
himself, in the dusky kitchen; and all the cheer- 
fulness he thought to see before was gone. The 
place seemed to him to have a desolate appearance 
upon it, that he had never noticed before. But the 
sorra change was on it, no more than the night 
will have got any darker really, when you go out 
into it after you being for a while in a room that 
was full up of light. It was himself that was 
different, after seeing into Rafferty’s, where the 
fire was small enough, God knows ! but the hearth 
was swep’ up tidy and nice. The table was old 
and shaky there, but it was scoured as white as 
the snow. And the wheel was singing its own little 
song of cheerful work, and there was talk and 
laughing going on ; and, above all, the gay shining 
little head of Rosy, that lit it up, like a bit of sun- 
shine come down out of the skies. Whereas 
Heffeman’s kitchen was all through-other, just 
as they had got up after their dinners . . . 
plates and pots and praty-skins all lying hither and 
over. The fire was nigh-hand out, and it all as 
silent as the grave. 

“And not a sod of turf left in!” says Heffeman 


21 


The Furry Farm 

to himself ; “ that’s a nice way for Art to be leaving 
the place, and he ped to mind it!” 

Out with him to the clamp, to get an armful of 
turf; and didn’t the two pigs meet him full, and 
they coming back from the garden, after they 
rooting there to their heart’s content. 

“There’s more of it, now!” he thinks to himself; 
“and a nice job I’ll have of it, striving to get them 
back to their sty ! Bad scran to Art ! I never seen 
such work! Cock him up, indeed! going off to 
his randy -voos , instead of minding his business!” 

But it was really himself that Mickey ought to 
have blamed in regard to the pigs, with his fidget- 
ing about and not fastening the door of the pigsty 
right, that had a loose hinge and required humour- 
ing, and had a right to be mended, along with all. 
But to the day of his death, Heffeman blamed 
them pigs on Art. And, still, he never let on a 
word to him of what was after happening about 
them. He was too angry, besides having a slow 
tongue. It was only in to himself he’d talk and 
argue. 

“ I wondher, now, what else Art neglected here, ” 
he thought, “to make off wid himself to Rafferty’s! 
How anshis he is, about the Widdah’s work 1 In 
troth, it’s kissin’ the child for the sake of the nurse 


22 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

he is! Coortin’, are ye? Maybe there’ll be more 
nor one word to be said about that! I might 
manage to clip yer wings for ye, me boyo, as sure as 
there’s a leg in a pot ! And of all the chat he was 
having out of him . . . ! But sure Art could 
talk down a hedgeful of sparrows, anny day of the 
year!” 

There’s the way he kept thinking over the thing, 
and there’s how he began first having a bad suspi- 
cion of Art, that the poor boy never earned. But 
just because he never spoke of what was in his 
mind, it kept rolling over and over there, till there 
was nothing so bad but what he thought Art was 
capable of it. 

Art never minded. Heffernan was always a bit 
dark in himself. So Art never got the chance of 
saying a word for himself, nor knew he was being 
watched and blamed and he going on the one way, 
off wid himself every evening to Rafferty’s, and 
would come back that happy and smiling that 
Mickey would be madder nor a wet hen, looking at 
him. 

So there’s the way it went on with the two of 
them; Heffernan sour and silent and miserable in 
himself; and Art no- ways put about, only quite 
gay and satisfied from morning till night. 


23 


The Furry Farm 

At last Heffernan made up his mind what he’d 
do. There came an evening ... a summer’s 
evening it was, more betoken . . . and when Art 
walked into Rafferty’s as usual, he found Rosy 
drowned in grief, and she crying down the tears 
as if she was after losing all belonging to her. 

“ Ora, what’s a trouble to ye, Rosheen acushla!” 
says Art ; but it was a while afore he could get an 
answer out of her she was that fretted and put 
about. But at long last she told him. Mr. 
Heffernan, she said, that was wanting to marry 
her. 

“ What ! ” says Art, bursting out into a big laugh ; 
“ould Heffernan to think to marry you! he that 
might be your father! ay, or your grandfather to 
the back of that, ready!” 

But Art was wrong about that. Heffernan 
wasn’t that far on at all. 

“That’s a nice joke to be putting out upon a 
body!” he says, “for of coorse it’s only non- 
sense ...” and he looks hard at her; “say 
it’s only joking y’are, Rosy!” 

“The sorra joke!” says poor Rosy, and she 
looking at him most pitiful, and her cheeks and 
eyes wet with the tears; so much so that Art 
thought well of doing his best to dry them for her ; 


24 


The Folk of Furry Farm 


and Rosy went on, “ He was down here this morn- 
ing, talking to me mother ...” 

“Well?” 

“Well, sure, what was I to do, only say that I 
wouldn’t agree to him; and then he got vexed, 
and says he to me mother, ‘ Go off, ’ he says, * to 
Father Connellan, and let him at her, to see to 
bring her to raison!’ And och! Art, jewel, what 
will I do, at all at all!” 

“Sure, never heed them!” says Art, very stout. 

“That’s all very fine! but they’ll all be agin 
me! Too sure I am that Father Connellan will be 
for Mickey, on account of the good wedding . . . 
all the money he has! And he has promised me 
mother to bring her to the Furry Farm, as well as 
me, and to give her every comfort. He says he’s 
after getting word of some one that is going to 
marry his sister bey ant there in England. So 
then, there wouldn’t be Julia on the flure, to con- 
tind wid. And me mother is to have a side-car 
to drive to Mass of a Sundah; and a slip of a 
sarvint-girl to be ordhering about, and every 
comfort, if only I’ll agree to take him. And of 
coorse she’s getting middling ould and wakely in 
herself . . . so there it is now ! ” 

“Well, don’t you cry any more, annyhow, 


25 


The Furry Farm 

Rosy!” says Art; “ look-at-here, if he wants a 
wife so terrible bad, and is so anshis to have your 
mother at the Furry Farm, why wouldn’t he take 
her there, and l’ave the two of us in p’ace and 
qui’tness?” 

“That’s only foolishness!” says Rosy. 

Still, the notion started her off to laugh, and 
that was what Art wanted. But sure, when people 
is young, it’s easy diverting their minds from what- 
ever has them annoyed. So Rosy and Art began 
talking and going on, and before very long they had 
clean forgotten old Heffernan and everything else, 
only their selves. 

That was all well enough, for that turn. But 
soon it became well known to them both, that it 
was apt to turn out no laughing matter for them. 
For, as Rosy had said, they were all against Art 
and for Heffernan. And the mother, in particular, 
gave Rosy neither ease nor rest, morning, noon, 
and night, only fighting the girl to take a man that, 
as she said, had a good means, and could keep her 
like a Princess. 

A woman like the Widdah Rafferty is not to be 
blamed for doing the like of that. She couldn’t 
but be a bit cowardly in herself, and she left the 
way she was, without one to come between her and 


26 


The Folk of F'urry Earm 

the world. Gay and pleasant as she was mostly, 
she knew enough of hardship to think a power of 
the offer Heffeman was after making, saying he 
would do for her as well as for Rosy. And the 
thoughts of the Furry Farm! All the stock upon 
it, and the kitchen with full and plenty in it; 
sides of bacon, and lashins and lavins of milk and 
turf and praties and meal . . . well, sure she 
couldn’t but be tempted with all that, for herself as 
well as for Rosy. Indeed she was of the opinion 
that she was doing the best she could for her child, 
as often as she’d begin argufying with her; abusing 
poor Art, and puffing up Heffeman. 

But all she done by that was, to make poor Rosy 
fret; and what else did she expect? 

Through it, not a word ever passed between the 
two men upon the business. Heffeman, as I said, 
was always a good warrant to hold his tongue. 
He thought now he had the thing so sure that he 
need only wait a bit. He knew how poor the 
Raffertys were. He didn’t want any upset or 
unpleasantness with Art, that maybe the boy 
would take and quit off, and leave him there wid 
himself, and not as much as one about the place 
to do a hand’s turn there. 

Heffeman was a slow-going sort of a man. The 


27 


The Furry Farm 

people all had it that he was a bit thick. But, 
anyway, he knew well enough what he was able for, 
and what he ought to let alone. He had no wish 
in life for getting shut of Art, till he’d have some 
one in his place, in on the ways of the Furry Farm. 
And he wanted to make sure of Rosy and the 
mother there, afore his own sister would be maybe 
hearing about it, and he knew her to be that con- 
thrary, that he wouldn’t put it past her to come off 
home at once, to spoil all his plans. He scarce 
ever heard a word from her, only there was a sketch 
going round Ardenoo of some talk of a match being 
made for her, what Rosy had mentioned to Art. 
Mickey was beginning to have good hopes out of 
that, thinking she might get some man to marry 
her there that wouldn’t know the differ. So he was 
doing his endeavours to hurry the thing up with 
Rosy, or at least with the mother; and sorra word 
out of his head to Art ; and Art the same with him. 

But Art would be nigh-hand mad betimes, with 
the way old Heffeman would look at him, as much 
as to say, “I have ye now, me boyo!” But he 
never axed to pass any remarks, good or bad. 
Why would he? He was sure of Rosy, so there 
would be neither use nor sense in having words with 
Mickey, that could do you a bad turn, as soon as 


28 


The Folk of Furry Farm 


look at you. And Art then took the notion that 
the Widdah Rafferty wasn’t all out as agreeable 
and pleasant-spoken to him as she had a right to 
be; not that she was to be blemt in that! So he 
and Rosy took to meeting with one another outside 
the house; at the well, maybe, or gathering sprigs 
for the fire, or the like of that ; and it wasn’t their 
fault if they did it secretly. 

It was in this way that Rosy was coming from 
the Chapel one evening, when Art met up with her, 
by the purest of accidents, of course. They had 
plenty to talk about, as is always the way with the 
likes of them. And if it was mostly about them- 
selves, sure, that’s what most of us finds very 
interesting and agreeable. 

“I’m in dread,” says Rosy, “this while back, 
that it’s what Mr. Heffeman has some iday of 
coming at me mother soon now for the rent . . .” 

“Sure, what’s that, only a flea-bite!” says Art. 

“Ah, but isn’t there four years owing? and how 
is that going to be ped? unless we can get to pacify 
him someways. And we behindhand at the Shop 
. . . and do you mind how the young turkeys died 
'on’ us last year? and that has left us very short 
ever since. And now the praties isn’t looking any 
too well ...” 


29 


The Furry Farm 

“In spite of you telling me to mind me eye, and 
we cutting the seed!” says Art; and then the 
both of them had to laugh, thinking how simple he 
near cut the thumb off of himself that evening. 
It’s a small thing will amuse a boy and girl like 
Rosy and Art. God knows they’ll have whips to 
fret and worry over, before their day is done here ! 
So why wouldn’t they laugh as long as they can? 

Well, and so Art would laugh right enough while 
he’d be in company with Rosy. But all the whole 
time he’d keep thinking and planning; and when 
the next fair-day of Clough-na-Rinka came round, 
and he had to be up and off before daylight with 
stock of Heffernan’s to sell there, didn’t he bring 
his own bullock amongst them! Grass for him 
was in Art’s agreement with Mickey, and I needn’t 
say that that animal hadn’t the worst spot of the 
farm, neither was there any fear of he to be over- 
looked at foddering-time, as long as there was a 
wad of hay left. But sure that’s only human 
nature, to look after your own. No matter how 
kind you are to others, you’ll always have the most 
heart for yourself. 

Art’s bullock was that fine a beast, that he was 
sold at top price, and the money was in Art’s 
pocket, long before Mickey Heffernan came bowl- 


30 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

ing up to the fair-green, on the side-car, in time for 
the regular business of the day. And how he got 
on there, and what price he got for his stores, 
is neither here nor there now. Art passed no 
remarks to him in regard to his own sale; sure, 
why would he? And as soon as he had done 
with Heffernan’s cattle, he slipped off with him- 
self, and Mickey went home without seeing him 
again. 

The next morning, when Heffernan went to go 
to get up, behould ye! sight nor light of Art there 
wasn’t to be got about the whole town. 

“And it’s too sure I am,” thinks Mickey to 
himself, “that he wasn’t in till late, whatever 
divilmint he was at! for I’d have heard him, up 
to nine o’clock, annyway! Nice conduction it is 
for he to be having, stopping out that-a-way, and 
neglecting his business, that he’s ped to do here 
for me ! And now, where at all should he be, and 
isn’t here seeing about things this morning, only 
leaving all to me! But I’ll not fau’t him; sure it’s 
not long he’ll be in it. I can bid him to go, in 
another little while, anny day I like! Only, where 
the mischief is he now! Maybe it’s what he’s 
taking to go to Rafferty’s, airly as well as late. 
Sure it’s only losing his time he is, and making a 


31 


The Furry Farm 

laugh of himself he is as well ; but divil mend him ! 
standing up wid impidence he is, this minute!” 

Off with Heffernan then to Rafferty’s, without 
even waiting to break his fast. When he got there, 
who should he see, only Tommy the Crab, airly 
and all as it was; and he with his pack upon the 
ground and talking away to the Widdah Rafferty. 

She that gave the lepp when she seen Heffernan ! 
the same as if she was half afraid of he hearing 
what Tommy had to say. But Mickey never said 
a word, only made a kind of a bow of the head 
when she passed him the time of day, and stood 
there. 

“Good mornin’, Mr. Heffernan,” says Tommy, 
that had a tongue in his head like the clapper of a 
bell; “I hope I see you as well as I’d wish you 
and all belonging to ye ! and that you may never be 
sick till I’m doctor enough to cure ye! and that 
won’t happen, till you’re that small, that you’ll 
have to stand up upon a sod of turf, to look into a 
naggin ! Well, sure, you’re just in time here to get 
the news that I’m about telling to Mrs. Rafferty. ” 

Heffernan never said one word, not even to ax, 
“What is it?” and so Tommy goes on, “I slep’ 
out last night, under the big furzy bush there 
below at the cross-roads, bekase I was a bit late 


32 


The Folk of Furry Farm 


and I coming from the fair. And along wid all, I 
had no great command of meself, after me day 
there, you per save. So, as I was a-loath to disturb 
any dacint house, knocking the people up to ax a 
bed from them, I just laid meself down there, 
where I had the best of shelter. Ay, and slep’ the 
best, too, till this morning, bright and airly, when 
I wakened hearing voices. And what should it 
be, only young Art, from beyant at your place, 
Mr. Heffernan, and little Rosy Rafferty, and they 
coming along the road to’arst me!” 

“The Lord save us!” says the Widdah; “sure 
it's not in aimest you are! and I having it laid 
out that it was what she was just a piece off from 
me in the fields, and she gethering a few sprigs 
for kindling. ...” 

“Well, sure, you should know! and maybe 
that’s what she was at; and that Art was helping 
her. I couldn’t rightly say. Only, if they were’ 
at that, they must have changed their minds, and 
have left the sprigs in the gaps they were stopping 
. . . ” and as he said the word, Heffernan gave a 
kind of a snort, for there was nothing he had more 
enmity to, than the fashion women does have, of 
pulling the bushes out of holes in the fences that 
he’d be after getting filled up. The weight of them 


33 


The Furry Farm 

would liefer do that, nor to pick up what little 
kindling-wood they’d want off the ground, and 
mostly always there’s plenty lying loose to their 
hand. 

Tommy went on with his story, and a smirk on 
his face when he saw the way he had Mickey 
annoyed about the sprigs. 

“Ay indeed! Nobody else in this earthly 
world, only their two selves! There they were, 
and they coming along, looking half proud of 
themselves, and half afraid; and their eyes round 
over their shoulders every minute, as if they were 
afraid of some one coming after them. And the 
big hurry there appeared to be on them ! 

“When they seen me, they stopped short. 

“‘In the name of God,’ says I to them, ‘where 
are yiz off to, at this hour,’ says I, ‘and the stars 
not out of the sky yet?’ 

“Art laughed, but Rosy blushed up. 

“‘Oho!’ says I, ‘what colour’s red? and is this 
what yiz are up to?’ 

“But they said nothing, only Art whips a whole 
big handful of money out of his pocket careless-like, 
as if it was just that much dirt. 

“‘What have you there?’ says he; and begins 
turning over every ha’porth in the pack on the 


34 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

ground beside me, the mouth of it being open ; and 
his hands shaking as if he was all of a thrimble ; 
and Rosy watching him with her eyes dancing, 
and still not asking to touch annything herself. 

“ ‘I have all soarts here,’ says I to him, making 
answer, ‘but sure it’s what I’m thinking it should 
some kind of a ring yous will be wanting . . . f 

“‘You just got it!’ he says; ‘but I doubt have 
you one good enough for us . . .ah! there’s a 
nice neckercher . . . we’ll take that, at anny 
rate ... do you remimber, Rosy? Is this as 
good as the one you offered to tie up that cut of 
mine . . . ? ’ and they both laughed out. 

“ ‘I’d wish it a taste brighter, ’ he says. 

“‘Sure, isn’t it grand!’ says she . . . ‘but 
Art! look at them for pickthers!’ and couldn’t 
stop herself, only taking up first one and then 
another. . . . 

“‘Would you wish e’er a one of them?’ he 
says. 

“‘They’d be aisy carrit,’ says I; ‘and more 
betoken, yous wouldn’t be getting them so raison- 
able as I can sell them, from them that has shops 
and rent to pay. . . . ’ 

“‘They’d look pleasant and homely, annywhere 
we’d be!’ says Rosy. 


35 


The Furry Farm 

“So they chose out a half-dozen or so; the 
Death of Lord Edward; and Emmet in the Dock, 
and so and so on; and they bid me to bring this 
one to you, and I was to say how that they were 
off to the Big Smoke 1 to have the wedding there, 
at your sister's. ...” 

“Ay, she's there in Dublin, this linth of time,” 
says the Widdah, quite composed now, and she 
smiling all over with joy. 

For there’s the way it is wid women. When 
they get a daughter marrit, no matter to who, 
they’ll be that proud, the weight of them, that 
they wouldn’t call the King their cousin. And 
along with all, of course, Art Heffeman was known 
to be a very choice boy, only for he being poor. 
But, as it was often said at Ardenoo, why need 
that stop him in the getting of a wife? Why 
mightn’t he as well be a poor man as a poor boy? 

“And to think of them sending me a keepsake!” 
says the mother; “dear, but that pickther is 
beautiful, the way it’s drew out!” 

“There’s a crack across the face of it,” says 
Mickey; and there’s the only word he had out of 
them. 

“So there is! and I never to observe it till you 


1 Dublin. 


36 The Folk of Furry Farm 

spoke!” says the Widdah, and she looking ready 
to go cry. 

“Sure it will never be noticed!” says Tommy, 
“and moreover, I took a pinny off of the price, in 
compliment to that little defect,” and I’m not 
saying but he did. “Here!” says Tommy, “I’ll 
give you a nail into the bargain to hang it up by ; 
and there’s a brave lump of a stone, to drive it in, 
and make it all safe upon the wall. Where will 
you wish to have it, mam?” 

“Here, where I can be seeing it, and I sitting 
at the wheel, ” says she. 

So Tommy hammered in the nail. 

“What’s the name of the pickther?” says the 
Widdah, and she standing back a piece off, the 
way she could get a good look at it. 

“It’s called ‘The Flight of the Wild Geese,”’ 
says Tommy, with a grin. 

And Heffernan just gave one laugh out of him; 
like the cough of a sick sheep it was, and turned 
about and went home. 


CHAPTER II 


THE GAME LEG 

Heffernan’s house at the Furry Farm stood very 
backwards from the roadside, hiding itself, you’d 
really think, from any one that might be happening 
by. As if it need do that! Why, there was no 
more snug, well-looked-after place in the whole of 
Ardenoo than Heffernan’s always was, with full 
and plenty in it for man and beast, though it 
wasn’t to say too tasty-looking. 

And it was terrible lonesome. There wasn’t a 
neighbour within the bawl of an ass of it. Heffer- 
nan of course had always been used to it, so that 
he didn’t so much mind; still, he missed Art, after 
he going off with little Rosy Rafferty. That was 
nigh-hand as bad upon him as losing the girl herself. 
He had got to depend on Art for every hand’s turn, 
a thing that left him worse when he was without 
him. And he was very slow-going. As long as 
Julia was there, she did all, and Heffernan might 
stand to one side and look at her. And so he 
37 


38 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

missed her now, more than ever; and still he had 
no wish to see her back, though even to milk the 
cows came awkward to him. 

He was contending with the work one evening, 
and the calves in particular were leaving him dis- 
tracted, above all, a small little white one that he 
designed for Rosy, when he’d have her Woman of 
the House at the Furry Farm. That calf, I needn’t 
say, was not the pick of the bunch, but as Mickey 
thought to himself, a girl wouldn’t know any bet- 
ter than choose a calf by the colour, and there 
would be no good wasting anything of value on her. 
At all events it would be “child’s pig and daddy’s 
bacon,” most likely, with that calf. But, sure, 
what matter! Rosy was never to have any call 
to it, or anything else at the Furry Farm. 

Those calves were a very sweet lot, so that 
Mickey might have been feeling all the pleasure 
in life, just watching them, with their soft little 
muzzles down in the warm, sweet milk, snorting 
with the pure enjoyment. But Mickey was only 
grousing to get done, and vexed at the way the 
big calves were shoving the little ones away, and 
still he couldn’t hinder them. Art used to regulate 
them very simple by means of a little ash quick 
he kept, to slap the forward calves across the face 


39 


The Game Leg 

when they’d get too impudent. But as often as 
Mickey had seen him do that, he couldn’t do the 
same. The ash quick was so close to him that if 
it had been any nearer it would have bitten him. 
Stuck up in a corner of the bit of ruin that had 
once been Castle Heffernan it was. But it might 
as well have been in America for all the good it was 
to Mickey. 

“I wish to God I was rid of the whole of yous, 
this minute!” says he to himself, and he with his 
face all red and steamy, and the milk slobbering 
out of the pail down upon the ground, the way the 
calves were butting him about the legs. 

That very minute, he heard a sound behind him. 
He turned about, and my dear! the heart jumped 
into his mouth, as he saw a great, immense red face, 
just peeping over the wall that shut in his yard 
from the boreen. That wall was no more than four 
feet high. Wouldn’t any one think it strange to 
see such a face, only that far from the ground ! and 
it with a bushy black beard around it, and big roll- 
ing eyes, and a wide old hat cocked back upon it? 
You’d have to think it was something “not right ” ; 
an Appearance or Witchery work of some kind. 

But, let alone that, isn’t there something very 
terrifying and frightful in finding yourself being 


40 The Folk of Furry Farm 

watched, when you think you’re alone ; and, of all 
things, by a man? The worst of a wild beast 
wouldn’t put the same bad fear in your heart. 

“Good-evening, Mr. Heffernan, ” says the new- 
comer, with a grin upon him, free and pleasant; 
“ that’s a fine lot of calves you have there ! ” 

Heffernan was so put about that he made no 
answer, and the man went on to say, “Is it that 
you don’t know me? Sure, you couldn’t forget 
poor old Hopping Hughie as simple as that!” 

And he gave himself a shove, so that he raised 
his shoulders above the wall. A brave big pair 
they were, too, but they were only just held up on 
crutches. Hughie could balance himself upon 
them, and get about, as handy as you please. But 
he was dead of his two legs. 

“Oh, Hughie . . . !” says Heffernan, pretty 
stiff, “well, and what do you want here?” 

“Och, nothing in life. ...” 

“Take it then, and let you be off about your 
business ! ” says Mickey as quick as a flash for once ; 
and he that was proud when he had it said ! 

Hughie had a most notorious tongue himself, but 
he knew when to keep it quiet, and he thought it as 
good to appear very mild and down in himself 
now, so he said, “My business! sure, what word is 


4i 


The Game Leg 

that to say to a poor old fellah on crutches! Not 
like you, Mr. Heffernan, that’ll be off to the 
fair of Balloch to-morrow morning, bright and 
early, with them grand fine calves of yours. The 
price they’ll go! There isn’t the peel of them in 
Ardenoo!” 

“Do you tell me that?” says Heffernan, that a 
child could cheat. 

“That’s what they do be telling me,” says 
Hughie. He could build a nest in your ear, he was 
that cunning. He thought he saw a chance of 
getting to the fair himself, and a night’s lodging as 
well, if he managed right. 

“ I wish to goodness I could get them there, so, ” 
says Mickey, “and hasn’t one to drive them for 
me!” 

“Would I do?” says Hughie. 

Heffernan looked at him up and down. 

“Sure you’d not be able!” 

“Whoo! Me not able? Maybe I’m like the 
singed cat, better than I look! I’m slow, but fair 
and easy goes far in a day ! Never you fear but I’ll 
get your calves to Balloch, the same way the boy 
ate the cake, very handy. . . . ” 

The simplest thing would have been for Heffer- 
nan to take and drive the calves himself. But he 


42 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

never had the fashion of doing such things. Any- 
way it wouldn’t answer for the people to see a man 
with a good means of his own, like Mickey, turning 
drover that way. 

So he thought again, while Hughie watched him ; 
and then says he, “You’ll have to be off out of this 
before the stars have left the sky!” 

“And why wouldn’t I?” says Hughie; “only 
give me a bit of supper and a shakedown for the 
night, the way I’ll be fresh for the road to-morrow. ” 

Hughie was looking to be put sitting down in the 
kitchen alongside Heffernan himself, and to have 
the settle-bed foreninst the fire to sleep in. But 
he had to content himself with the straw in the 
barn and a plateful carried out to him. Queer and 
slow-going Heffernan might be, but he wasn’t 
thinking of having the likes of Hopping Hughie in 
his chimney-corner, where he had often thought to 
see little Rosy Rafferty and she smiling at him. 

Hughie took it all very contented. Gay and 
happy he was after his supper, and soon fell asleep 
on the straw, with his ragged pockets that empty, 
that the Divil could dance a hornpipe in them and 
not strike a copper there; while Mickey above in 
bed in his own house, with his fine farm and all his 
stock about him, calves and cows and pigs, not to 


43 


The Game Leg 

speak of the money in the old stocking under the 
thatch . . . Mickey couldn’t sleep, only worry- 
ing, thinking was he right to go sell the calves at 
all ; and to be letting Hughie drive them ! 

“I had little to do,” he thought, “to be letting 
him in about the place at all, and couldn’t tell 
what divilment he might be up to, as soon as he 
gets me asleep! Hughie’ s terrible wicked, and as 
strong as a ditch! I done well to speak him civil, 
anyway. But I’ll not let them calves stir one 
peg out of this with him! I’d sooner risk keeping 
them longer. . . . ” 

There’s the way he was going on, tossing and 
tumbling and tormenting himself ; as if bed wasn’t 
a place to rest yourself in and not be raking up 
annoyances. 

So it wasn’t till near morning that Mickey dozed 
off, and never wakened till it was more than time 
to be off for the fair. 

Up he jumped and out to stop Hughie. But 
the yard was silent and empty. Hughie and the 
calves were gone. 

Mickey was more uneasy than ever. 

“A nice bosthoon 1 I must be,” he thought, “to 
go trust my good-looking calves to a k'nat 2 like 

3 Rogue. 


1 Fool. 


44 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

Hughie! And he to go off without any breakfast, 
too . . . !” 

Heffernan was a good warrant to feed man or 
beast. But he mightn’t have minded about 
Hughie, that had plenty of little ways of providing 
for himself. His pockets would be like sideboards, 
the way he would have them stuck out with meat 
and eggs and so on, that he would be given along 
the road. Hughie was better fed than plenty that 
bestowed food upon him. 

Balloch, where the fair is held, is the wildest and 
most lonesome place in Ardenoo, with a steep rough 
bit of road leading up to it, very awkward to drive 
along. Up this comes Heffernan, on his side-car, 
driving his best, and in a great hurry to know where 
would he come on Hughie. He had it laid out in 
his own mind that sight nor light of his calves he 
never would get in this world again. So it was 
a great surprise to him to find them there before 
him, safe and sound. His heart lightened at that 
as if a millstone was lifted off it. 

And the fine appearance there was upon them! 
Not a better spot in the fair-green, than where 
Hughie had them, opposite a drink-tent where the 
people would be thronging most. And it was a 
choice spot for Hughie too. Happy and contented 


45 


The Game Leg 

he was, his back against a tree, leaning his weight 
on one crutch and the other convenient to his hand. 

“ So there’s where you are!” says Mickey, when 
he came up. 

“Ah, where else!” says Hughie, a bit scornful. 
Sure it was a foolish remark to pass, and the man 
there before him, as plain as the nose on your face. 
But Hughie was puzzled, too, by the look of relief 
he saw on Mickey’s face. He understood nothing 
of what Heffernan was after passing through. It’s 
an old saying and a true one, “Them that has the 
world has care!” but them that hasn’t it, what do 
they know about it? 

While Hughie was turning this over in his mind, 
Mickey was throwing an eye upon the calves, and 
then, seeing they were all right, he was bandying 
off with himself, when Hughie said, “Terrible 
dry work it is, driving stock along them dusty 
roads since the early morning!” and he rubbed the 
back of his hand across his mouth with a grin. 

At that, Mickey put his hand into his pocket 
and felt round about, and then pulled it out empty. 

“I’ll see you later, Hughie,” says he, “I’ll not 
forget you, never fear! Just let you wait here, 
till I have the poor mare attended to that drew 
me here. ...” 


46 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

So he went off to do this, and then into the 
drink- tent with him, the way he could be getting 
a sup himself. But no sign of he to give anything 
to Hughie. And there now is where Mickey made 
a big mistake. 

He met up with a couple or three that he was 
acquainted with in the tent, and they began to 
talk of this thing and that thing, so that it was a 
gay little while before Mickey came out again. 

When he did, “What sort is the drink in there, 
Mr. Heffernan?” says Hughie. 

Now what Mickey had taken at that time was 
no more than would warm the cockles of his heart. 
So he looked quite pleasant and said, “Go in 
yourself, Hughie, and here’s what will enable you 
to judge it!” 

And he held out a shilling to Hughie. 

“A bird never yet flew upon the one wing, Mr. 
Heffernan!” said Hughie, that was looking to get 
another shilling, and that would be only his due 
for driving the calves. 

Mickey said nothing one way or the other, only 
went off, and left Hughie standing there, holding 
out his hand in front of him with the shilling in 
it, lonesome. 

He that was vexed ! He got redder in the face 


47 


The Game Leg 

than ever, and gave out a few curses, till he remem- 
bered there wasn’t one to hear him. So he stopped 
and went into the tent and I needn’t say he got the 
best value he could there. 

But all the time, he was thinking how badly 
Heffernan was after treating him, putting him off 
without enough to see him through the fair even, 
let alone with a trifle in his pockets to help him on 
his rounds. He began planning how he could pay 
out Mickey. 

He got himself back to the same spot, near the 
calves, to see what would happen. After a time 
he saw Heffernan coming back, and little Barney 
Maguire was with him. A very decent boy Barney 
was, quiet and agreeable; never too anxious for 
work, but very knowledgeable about how things 
should be done, from a wake to a sheep-shearing. 
Heffernan always liked to have Barney with him 
at a fair. 

The two of them stood near the calves, careless- 
like, as if they took no interest in them at all. 

A dealer came up. 

“How much for them calves? Not that I’m in 
need of the like, ” says he. 

“Nobody wants you to take them, so,” says 
Barney, “but the price is three pounds . . . 


48 


The Folk of Furry Farm 


or was it guineas you're after saying, Mr. 
Heffernan?” 

Heffernan said nothing, and the dealer spoke up 
very fierce, “Three pounds! Put thirty shillings 
on them, and I’ll be talking to ye!” 

Mickey again only looked at his adviser, and 
says Barney, “Thirty shillings! ’Tis you that’s 
bidding wide, this day! May the Lord forgive 
you! Is it wanting a present you are, of the finest 
calves in all Ardenoo!” 

Heffernan swelled out with delight at that; as 
if Barney’s word could make his calves either better 
or worse. 

“Wasn’t it fifty-seven and sixpence you’re after 
telling me you were offered only yesterday, Mr. 
Heffernan,” says Barney, “just for the small ones 
of the lot?” 

“Och! I dare say! don’t you?” says the 
dealer; “the woman that owns you it was that 
made you that bid, to save your word!” 

Poor Mickey! and he that hadn’t a woman at 
all! The dealer of course being strange couldn’t 
know that, nor why Hughie gave a laugh out of 
him then. 

But that didn’t matter. Mickey took no notice. 
A man that’s a bit “thick” escapes many a prod 


49 


The Game Leg 

that another would feel sharp. So in all things you 
can see how them that are afflicted are looked after 
in some little way we don’t know. 

The dealer looked at the calves again. 

“ Troth, I’m thinking it’s the wrong ones yous 
have here! Yous must have forgotten them fine 
three-pound calves at home!” 

And Mickey began looking very anxiously at 
them, as if he thought maybe he had made some 
mistake. 

“Them calves,” says the dealer slowly, “isn’t 
like a pretty girl, that every one will be looking to 
get! And, besides, they’re no size! A terrible 
small calf they are!” 

“Small!” said Barney, “it’s too big they are! 
And if they’re little, itself, what harm! Isn’t 
a mouse the prettiest animal you might ask 
to see!” 

“Ay is it!” says the dealer, “but it’ll take a 
power of mice to stock a farm!” and off with him, 
in a real passion, by the way of. 

But Barney knew better than to mind. The 
dealer came back, and at long last the calves were 
sold and paid for. Then the luck-penny had to be 
given. Hard-set Barney was to get Heffernan to 
do that. In the end, Mickey was so bothered over 


4 


50 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

it, that he dropped a shilling just where Hughie 
was standing leaning his weight on the one crutch 
as usual. 

As quick as a flash, he had the other up, and 
made a kind of a lurch forward, as if to look for the 
money. But he managed to get the second crutch 
down upon the shilling, to hide it; and then he 
looked round about upon the ground, as innocent 
as a child, as if he was striving his best to find the 
money for Mickey. 

“ Where should it be, at all at all?” says Hughie; 
“ bewitched it should be, to say it’s gone like 
that!” 

And Heffernan standing there with his mouth 
open, looked as if he had lost all belonging to him. 
Then he began searching about a good piece off 
from where the shilling fell. 

“It’s not there you’ll get it!” said Barney; 
“sure you ought always look for a thing where you 
lost it!” 

He went over to Hughie. 

“None of your tricks, now! It’s you has Mr. 
Heffernan’s money, and let you give it up to him!” 

“Is it me have it? Sure if I had, what would 
I do, only hand it over to the man that owns it!” 
says Hughie. 


5i 


The Game Leg 

On the word, he let himself down upon the 
ground, and slithered over on top of the shilling. 

But quick and all as he was, Barney was 
quicker. 

“Sure you have it there, you vagabone you! 
Give it up, and get off out of this with yourself!” 

And he caught Hughie a clip on the side of the 
head that sent him sprawling on the broad of his 
back. And there, right enough, under him was 
the shilling. 

So Barney picked it up, and for fear of any other 
mistake, he handed it to the dealer himself. 

“It's an ugly turn whatever, to be knocking a 
poor cripple about that-a-way!” said the dealer, 
dropping the luck-penny into his pocket. 

“Ach, how poor he is, and let him be crippled, 
itself!” says Barney; “it’s easy seeing you’re 
strange to Ardenoo, or you’d not be compassion- 
ating Hughie so tender!” 

No more was said then, only into the tent with 
them again to wet the bargain. Hughie gathered 
himself up. He was in the divil’s own temper. 
Small blame to him, too! Let alone the dis- 
appointment about the shilling, and the knock 
Barney gave him, the people all had a laugh at him. 
And he liked that as little as the next one. You’d 


52 The Folk of Furry Farm 

think he’d curse down the stars out of the skies 
this time, the way he went on. 

And it wasn’t Barney’s clout he cared about, 
half as much as Mickey’s meanness. It was that 
had him so mad. He felt he must pay Heffernan 
out. 

He considered a bit; then he gave his leg a slap. 

“ 1 have it now!” he said to himself. 

He beckoned two young boys up to him, that 
were striving to sell a load of cabbage plants they 
had there upon a donkey’s back, and getting bad 
call for them. 

“It’s a poor trade yous are doing to-day,” said 
Hughie; “and I was thinking in meself yous 
should be very dry. Y ou wouldn’t care to earn the 
price of a pint?” 

“How could we?” says the boys. 

“ I’ll tell you ! Do you see that car ? ’ ’ and Hughie 
pointed to where Heffernan had left his yoke 
drawn up, and the old mare cropping a bit as well 
as she could, being tied by the head; “well, 
any one that will pull the linch-pin out of the wheel, 
on the far side of that car, needn’t be without 
tuppence to wet his whistle ...” and Hughie 
gave a rattle to a few coppers he had left in his 
pocket. 


53 


The Game Leg 

“Yous’ll have to be smart about it too,” said 
he, “or maybe whoever owns that car will have 
gone off upon it, afore yous have time to do the 
primest bit of fun that ever was seen upon this 
fair-green!” 

“Whose is the car?” 

“Och, if I know!” says Hughie; “but what 
matter for that ? One man is as good as another at 
the bottom of a ditch! ay and better. It will be 
the hoith of divarsion to see the roll-off they’ll get 
below there at the foot of the hill . . . . ” 

“Maybe they’d get hurted!” said the boys. 

“Hurted, how-are-ye!” says Hughie; “how 
could any one get hurted so simple as that? I’d be 
the last in the world to speak of such a thing in 
that case ! But if yous are afraid of doing it ...” 

“Afraid! that’s queer talk to be having!” 
says one of them, very stiff, for like all boys he 
thought nothing so bad as to have “afraid” said 
to him; “no, but we’re ready to do as much as 
the next one!” 

“I wouldn’t doubt yiz!” said Hughie; “h-away 
with the two of you now! Only mind! don’t let 
on a word of this to any sons of man . . . 

Off they went, and Hughie turned his back on 
them and the car, and stared at whatever was 


54 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

going on the other end of the fair. He hadn’t long 
to wait, before Heffernan and Barney and the 
dealer came out of the drink-tent. Hughie took 
a look at them out of the corner of his eye. 

“Ah!” he said to himself, “all ‘ purty-well-I- 
thank-ye!’ after what they drank inside! But 
wait a bit, Mickey Heffernan. . . . ” 

The three men went over to where Heffernan’s 
car was waiting. The boys were gone. The other 
two men helped Mickey to get his yoke ready. 
Then he got up, and they shook hands a good many 
times. Heffernan chucked at the reins and started 
off. 

Hughie was watching, and when he saw how 
steadily the old mare picked her way down the 
steep boreen, he began to be afraid he hadn’t hit 
on such a very fine plan at all. And if Mickey 
had only had the wit to leave it all to the poor 
dumb beast, she might have brought him home 
safe enough. 

But nothing would do him, only to give a shout 
and a flourish of the whip, half-way down the hill. 
The mare started and gave a jump. She was big 
and awkward, much like Mickey himself. Still, it 
was no fault of her, that, when she got to the turn, 
the wheel came off and rolled away to one side. 


55 


The Game Leg 

Down came the car, Mickey fell off, and there he 
lay, till some people that saw what was going on 
ran down the hill after him, and got the mare on 
to her feet, and not a scratch on her. 

But poor Mickey ! It was easy to see with half 
an eye that he was badly hurt. 

“Some one will have to drive him home, what- 
ever,” said Barney, coming up the hill to look for 
more help, after doing his best to get Mickey to 
stand up ; and, sure, how was he to do that, upon 
a broken leg? “A poor thing it is, too, to see 
how a thing of the kind could occur so simple! 
and a decent man like Heffernan to be nigh-hand 
killed. ...” 

“’Deed and he is a decent man!” said Hughie; 
“and why wouldn’t he? I’d be a decent man 
meself if I had the Furry Farm and it stocked. . . .” 

“He’s in a poor way now, in any case,” said 
Barney. “I doubt will he ever get over this 
rightly ! That’s apt to be a leg to him, all his life ! ” 

“Well, and so, itself!” said Hughie; “haven’t 
I two of them lame legs? and who thinks to pity 
Hughie?” 

“It’s another matter altogether, with a man like 
Mr. Heffernan,” said Barney; “what does the 
like of you miss, by not being able to get about, 


56 The Folk of Furry Farm 

compared with a man that might spend his time 
walking a-through his cattle, and looking at his 
crops growing, every day in the week?” 

“To be sure, he could be doing all that!” said 
Hughie, “but when a thing of this kind happens 
out so awkward, it's the will of God, and the will of 
man can’t abate that!” 


CHAPTER III 


THE “REST OF HIM” 

This is how it happened with poor Mickey Heffer- 
nan that he was left with a “game” leg, soon after 
he had had that falling-out with Art and the 
Raffertys, on account of the little girl there. His 
sister Julia came home, of course, as soon as she 
got word about the accident. She looked after 
him well, and not alone that, but she managed the 
outside work about the place too, till Mickey was 
so far recovered as to be able to get about himself ; 
at first on two crutches like Hughie himself, and 
then by degrees he was well enough to do with 
just a stick. 

Well and good. As long as he was helpless, and 
depending on Julia for everything, she and he hit 
it off together, all right. A contrary woman is 
often like that. She’ll let you do nothing, as long 
as you are well, and would be able for a bit of 
sport and amusement. But once you are laid up 
so that you could enjoy nothing, she’ll encourage 
57 


58 The Folk of Furry Farm 

you to do the very things that would enrage her 
at other times. 

This explains how it was that Julia flew into a 
tearing rage one morning, when Mickey was on his 
feet again, because he asked for a second egg for 
his breakfast. While he was in bed, she would be 
trying to force food on him, when he had no appe- 
tite for anything; I’m not saying that this is why 
she pressed the things on him; but anyway, now 
that he was up again and had a wish for food, it 
seemed as if she grudged it to him. 

With Julia, one word borrowed another, al- 
though Mickey never made her answer. It saves 
quarrelling most times, but not with Julia. She 
would work herself into a rage all the more when 
he kept quiet and seemed to take no notice. Of 
course, that is an annoying thing. The end of it 
was, that Julia went off again, to stay with some 
friends in Dublin it was, this time. 

It was a foolish step for Julia to take, but to be 
sure she did not know what was in Mickey’s mind, 
nor how having lost little Rosy Rafferty had not 
put him off the notion of getting a wife. It was 
only more anxious than ever he was now to be 
married. He was just as glad to be quit of Julia, 
the way he could be looking about him, without 


The “Rest of Him” 


59 


any interference from her. In fact, he knew very 
well that his only chance would be to take the 
ball at the hop, and look out for a woman that 
would be suitable, when Julia would be out of the 
way. 

How he managed in the long run to rid himself 
of Julia was a most curious affair. Of all the 
people in Ardenoo, Peter Caffrey was the last 
that he would have expected help from in the 
business. 

Peter, or Peetcheen as he was mostly always 
called, was the only boy that was left of the Caf- 
freys at the cross-roads, before you come to the 
turn leading on to Clough-na-Rinka. A very long, 
weak family of them there used to be there. The 
poor mother found it hard to keep going at all, 
particularly after the father died. In fact, Dark 
Molly Reilly would say, she really thought Al- 
mighty God must have some little way of His 
own of feeding people like the Caffreys, that no one 
knew anything about. 

They had the house for nothing, anyway. But a 
bad house it was; the roof let in wet, every time 
rain fell, the same as if it was coming through a 
sieve. And the smoke from the hearth curled up 
in clouds, and escaped by the door just as freely 


6o 


The Folk of Furry Farm 


as it did through the chimney. It was old Peter 
Caffrey, Peetcheen’s grandfather, that he was 
called after, that had built the house himself, and 
had managed to edge it in on a piece o' waste 
ground that no one could claim ; so that’s how there 
was no rent to be paid. That is a great help to 
any one, to be rent-free; let alone to the Caffreys, 
that were always as poor as Job’s dog. There 
never was one of them had two halfpence to 
jingle on a tombstone. But still, poor and all as 
they were, they managed to be cheerful and con- 
tented and would suffer on, someway. It was the 
mother that saw to that. 

One of the longest things that Peetcheen could 
look back on was the way Miss O’ Farrell from the 
Big House laughed one day that she happened to 
be passing by and overheard Dark Moll passing 
the time of day with his father. 

“How are you, Jack?” said Moll, “and how’s 
the rest of ye, man dear?” 

By that word, “the rest,” she meant his wife, 
the other part of him. But Miss O’Farrell took it 
up wrong. 

“The Rest?” she said; “why, that name fits 
Mrs. Caffrey like her skin! And it’s you that 
are the lucky man, Jack Caffrey, to have Rest! 


The “Rest of Him” 


61 


For there’s nothing like rest, in all this wide 
world!” 

With that, she gave a little sob or sigh; it may 
have been because she was out of breath, for she 
was walking very fast. What else could it be? 
What trouble could be on the likes of Miss O’ Far- 
rell, living in a fine house, with full and plenty of 
everything she could want in it, and no one to 
interfere with her, except the father, and he doted 
down on her, his only child? 

“Won’t you come in and take a heat of the fire, 
miss?” said Mrs. Caffrey, coming to the door very 
smiling. It would do you good to see her, she was 
so nice and quiet and easy-going. Nothing ever 
hurried her or put her about. 

“I’m afraid I haven’t time to-day, thank you, 
Mrs. Caffrey,” said the young lady, and off she 
went, at a sweep’s trot, you might say; and left 
them standing there, Mrs. Caffrey with her hands 
under her apron, looking after her till she was out 
of sight. 

All that remained in Peetcheen’s mind. He was 
just after coming from the well, he and the next 
smallest child, with a can of water slung on a stick 
between them. It was pretty heavy, and they got 
it hard to carry it; although before they had it 


62 


The Folk of Furry Farm 


landed into the kitchen for their mother, more than 
half of it had spilled out, because they could not 
keep it steady. And when they were rid of their 
burden, whatever the other child did, Peetcheen 
just went off to rest himself; what he was just in 
time to hear Miss 0’ Farrell say was such a good 
thing ! 

But without any such word from her, rest was a 
thing Peetcheen was always ready for. He took 
after the mother in that. If there was no stool 
ready for him . . . and in houses like Caffrey’s 
furniture is never too plentiful ; nothing is, except 
children; every seat there was, two would be 
wanting it; and the same with the food . . . well 
Peetcheen would just step aside, and wait. 

Truth to tell, he was one of the sort that really 
is anxious for nothing so much as to keep out of the 
way, and will let every one else get in ahead of 
them. Above all, with work. Whenever there 
was talk of a job to be done, Peetcheen was the 
last to make any attempt at it ; frightened, as it 
were, at the thought of it. This is how it came 
about that when all the others of the Caffrey 
family went off, one here, another there, accord- 
ing as a chance turned up, and as many as 
could to America, Peetcheen was left on at home. 


The “Rest of Him” 


63 


At Ardenoo, there was nothing scarcer than 
work; unless, maybe, money. The labour went 
out when the machines came in. The tillage was 
all given up, in any case. Every side you could 
see only grass farms, that there would be no 
labour wanted for, only a herd with his collie-dog. 
The farmers are blamed for this, but why would 
they not do what would bring them in the best 
return? It’s only human nature, that nothing 
can alter, only God, for every one to do the best 
he can for himself. 

Besides, when there would be two or three look- 
ing for every job, why wouldn’t a man take the 
best he could get to do it for him? That is how 
Peetcheen was always left out in the cold. He 
never was the best at anything. Civil-spoken and 
willing the creature was always. Somehow, what- 
ever he would attempt would go contrary on him 
though. 

“I don’t know at all what sort of a gaum you 
must be, Peetcheen!” said Big Cusack to him, one 
day that they were drawing home his turf from the 
bog, and Peetcheen had come along with no more 
than a half-load; “a body would think it was tea- 
cakes for ladies you had laid out so careful, instead 
of sods of turf!” 


64 The Folk of Furry Farm 

Peetcheen was standing, with his mouth open, 
staring at the half-empty cart, and at last he said, 
“Sure I’m stupid, and always was! I filled that 
cart full, when I was leaving the bog .... It’s 
what I have a right to be hommered!” 

“What use would it be, to go thrash ye?” said 
Cusack; “only a waste of time! Letting the fine 
turf dribble out along the road, for the want of 
fastening the creel in the back of the cart! You 
give me a disgoost with yer foolishness! I have 
no patience with the like!” 

Peetcheen made him no answer, and Big Cusack 
got madder than ever. 

“It’s ashamed of yourself you ought to be,” 
he began again, “a big gobbeen like you, sitting at 
home, and taking the bit out of your poor old 
mother’s mouth ! Don’t let me see your big, useless 
carcass here again ! What ails you, that you can’t 
be a man or a mouse? Why don’t ye strike off 
somewhere for yourself, where the people don’t 
know you, and you might have a chance?” 

“Well, from this out!” said poor Peetcheen. 

The very next day, it was all over Ardenoo that 
Peetcheen was after quitting. 

Dark Moll went to see his mother about it. 

“ It’s not true what they’re all saying below there 


The “Rest of Him” 65 

at the Shop, Mrs. Caffrey, mam,” said she, 
“that Peetcheen has wint off from you?” 

“Ay, is it true,” said the mother; “the poor 
child, he went off, ere last night, and had nothing 
only a clean shirt and a pair of stockings between 
him and the world . . . ” and she began to cry. 

“Just so,” said Moll, “like the boy going away 
to seek his fortune in the old story, wid the half- 
cake and the blessing from his mammy. . . . ” 
“He had that, whether or which,” said Mrs. 
Caffrey; “for a quieter, better boy never broke 
bread! And there he is now gone off from me; 
whatever riz his mind, that he couldn’t content 
himself at home here with me?” 

“God send him safe, whatever way he struck 
off!” said Moll; “and lonesome you’ll be here, 
agrah! without your fine boy!” 

“I miss him, the shockingest ever you knew!” 
said the mother, and she wiped her eyes on the 
corner of her little shawl; “if it was no more than 
the look of his brogues of an evening, and they 
steaming there by the fire . . . . ” 

“Ay, do ye miss him, and will, too!” said Moll, 
very compassionately; “and the empty settle-bed 
and all! But if it would be consolations to ye, I 
could stop here for a while, anyway, and keep an 


s 


66 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

eye on things, while you would have to be away; 
getting the water, or kindling ... or below at 
the Shop ...” 

Well, Mrs. Caffrey had no wish for Moll to be 
there for a constancy for different reasons. Moll 
was not very tasty in some of her ways, and she 
had a very long tongue. But Mrs. Caffrey had 
no excuse ready, and so it was easier to let the 
dark woman stay than to turn her away; and 
Mrs. Caffrey always did the easiest thing. 

This is how Moll got a stopping-place there for 
a time. It contented her well. She had been very 
anxious to quit Molally’s, where she had been. 
They were decent people enough, but the house 
was narrow, and himself would be up striking 
lights at all hours, going out to look after the ewes 
and lambs that he had in his care. He was a herd. 
Moll felt it hard being disturbed out of her sleep. 
She thought she might do worse than stop at 
Caffrey ’s for a bit, anyway. 

Peetcheen went off, and a wandering boy like 
him will often go far enough, before he meets up 
with a chance of work. He was in Dublin for a 
while, but he thought bad of having to keep on at 
it, ding-dong, the whole day. He wanted to be 
somewhere that you need not be in a hurry, and 


The “Rest of Him” 


67 


if you like, betimes you might turn up a bucket and 
sit on it, and take a few blasts of a pipe; and not 
one to find fault with you for it. 

But even at Ardenoo, a pet job like that is not 
very easy to find. Peetcheen thought he had his 
fortune made, when he got work at fifteen shillings 
a week, instead of the six he would get at Ardenoo. 
But he had not reckoned on paying out for every- 
thing he wanted, even to his washing, that the 
poor mother always did for him at home. He 
found the money little enough, and he had nothing 
at all to send to her, as he thought of doing. 
Maybe another boy would have managed better. 
But Peetcheen was just himself, and not another! 
He had no great sense about anything. 

In Ardenoo, the neighbours would ask, “How 
is Peetcheen? what news have you from him?” 

“Ah, what but good news!” Mrs. Caffrey would 
answer. Indeed, if no news is good news, she had 
nothing to complain about. There had never been 
but the one letter from Peetcheen, and the most of 
it was taken up sending remembrances and good 
wishes to this body and that, at home. 

But the mother kept it safe, put up on top of 
the dresser, with her Prayer Book, and her clean 
cap for Sunday. 


68 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

Peetcheen did not keep that job for very long. 
He could not content himself, where the work was 
so hard and constant. But what matter? he 
would not be kept there in any case. He got the 
sack; and then he felt he had had enough of town 
ways, and he wandered off into the country again. 

After some little time, he found himself back 
again, not too far from home at all, only it chanced 
that he was not very well acquainted with any part 
of Ardenoo, except just about his own home. So 
he did not know the farmer’s place that he found 
himself near, one evening, that he went up to, and 
asked shelter for the night. 

It was the Furry Farm. But, as has been 
explained, that house was very backwards, and 
Heffernan seldom left it, especially now that he was 
a bit helpless, with the game leg. So it was small 
blame to Peetcheen not to know where he was, or 
who it was he was speaking to. And Peetcheen 
was very slow. Many a thing that every one else 
would know, he would be as ignorant of as if he 
was a black stranger. 

This turned out to his advantage now. For 
when he heard Mickey saying that he wanted a 
handy boy about the place, Peetcheen made no 
remark about Julia being gone off, though it had 


The “Rest of Him” 


69 


been common talk in Ardenoo, before even he had 
left it. He just said, “ If you’ll give me the chance, 
sir, I’ll do me best to please ye!” 

So Heffernan, after some further talk, agreed 
to that. He hired Peetcheen. The place suited 
the boy down to the ground. It was no town 
style there. Everything slow and easy-going. 
No one there, except Heffernan and himself; 
and they were very much of the same gait of 
going. 

Farming is a grand business for them that are 
fond of keeping a pipe in their mouths and their 
hands in their pockets. It’s often remarked that 
when you do that, not much else finds its way in! 
But, then, not much finds its way out. You’ll 
not get rich, maybe, but you can keep going. 
Anyway, money isn’t everything. 

Before Peetcheen had been very long at the 
Furry Farm, he began to notice that Heffernan 
would seem a bit uneasy at times. He was very 
silent. Often of an evening, he would go off 
somewhere with himself, either limping on his 
stick, or maybe driving himself on the side-car. 
While he would be away, Peetcheen would be left 
inside at the fire, and nothing to keep him company 
unless to watch a pot boiling over the hearth or 


70 


The Folk of Furry Farm 


something of that kind. But Peetcheen never ob- 
jected to that, because he would as soon be in 
one place as another, and maybe sooner. 

But one evening, Mickey stayed out very late. 
When he came in, he sat down opposite Peetcheen, 
and pushed back his old hat, and says he, blowing 
a big sigh out of him: 

“ It’s well for you, to be sitting there and nothing 
to torment you! And you looking as if you had 
the world in your pocket!” 

Peetcheen took a while to think this over, and 
then he said, “It appears middling snug here! 
Plenty to eat and drink, and a good way of lying 
down at night. And what more can a man want ? ’ ’ 

“I want more, anyway!” answered Heffernan; 
“there’s a woman wanting here, to have an eye 
over the place, and not let it be getting all through- 
other the way it is. . . . ” 

“Won’t the sister you were telling me of be back 
from Dublin . . . ?” 

Then Mickey looked at Peetcheen with a very 
pitiful eye. 

“She will, in troth!” he said. 

He took a few draws of his pipe, and then, “I 
may’s well tell you the whole business!” he went 
on. At the same time, he did not; nor had the 


The '‘Rest of Him” 71 

smallest intention of telling it. But who ever 
does tell their whole mind? 

“The way of it is this,” said Mickey; “I’m 
wishing this length of time to get a wife in here, and 
am looking about for some one that would be 
suitable. But it’s tedious, and very severe work 
on a man like me. There’s a power to be con- 
sidered. There’s Julia, now; she that’s my sister; 
her and whatever girl I’d take might not get on 
well together. In fact, she would be dead against 
my bringing any one in on this floor, as long as 
she’s on it herself. I was turning over in me own 
mind, could I make up a match for herself . . . 
that would settle it . . . but, sure, I tried that 
over and over ... at least, she did. . . . ” 

“Hard to be plased, maybe?” said Peetcheen, 
lifting the pot off the hooks. 

“ Och, I don’t know about that ! ” said Heffernan. 

At the time, he was looking at Peetcheen stand- 
ing with the big black pot in his grip. And what- 
ever his poor old mother might think of Peetcheen, 
the boy was no beauty. But Mickey had a notion 
in his head, and he thought he would see it out. 

“A quiet, steady boy might do worse, you’d 
think, than get a hard-working girl, settled and 
sensible and not too young or skittish . . . and 


72 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

she with two heifers of her own . . . and maybe 
a few odd pounds in an old stocking as well. . . . ” 

“They might, so,” agreed Peetcheen. He 
wondered what was making Mickey so chatty. 

Then, “Why don’t you get marrit yourself?” 
said Heffernan, with a grin. And slow and thick 
as Peetcheen was, he began to guess what it was 
all about. 

“I might do so as well as another,” he made 
answer; “do you think would the sisther try 
me?” 

And to think that marrying was the last thing 
he had in his mind, when he began lifting the pig’s 
pot, just a minute or so before ! But Mickey had it 
all laid out, and he did not care a straw who got 
Julia so long as she would clear out of the house and 
leave him free to bring in a wife. 

“Ye have a house, ye tell me?” he said to 
Peetcheen. 

“ I have, so ! and not a soul in it, only me mother, 
and she the quietest creature!” 

“How much land?” asked Heffernan. 

Why he said that, is hard to know! Of course 
he must have had some notion of the way it was 
with the Caffreys, he living so long in the place. 
Still, it was always hard to tell what Mickey knew 


The “ Rest of Him” 


73 


or did not know! And he may have been trying 
to make out to himself that he really thought he 
was making a good match for Julia. 

“ I never got the land measured, ” saidPeetcheen. 
You would think he was humouring the thing. 
“I never got it measured; but there's no rent to 
be paid.” 

Measured indeed! and rent to be paid, and for 
what? A bare patch of weeds by the roadside 
that would not be enough to sod a lark ! 

Heffernan smoked on, and then Peetcheen began 
questioning in his turn, “How much are you offer- 
ing, with the two heifers?” 

In fact, the boy did not know if he was standing 
on his head or his heels! To hear himself being 
bid up in marriage like that ! And for a wife with 
a fortune of her own! 

“Thirty pound!” said Heffernan. 

“Forty!” said Peetcheen, very determined. 

“Thirty and no more!” 

“Forty and no less!” 

Well, in the long run, they split the difference 
between them, and settled the business then and 
there. Heffernan wrote off to the sister, telling her 
that he was as good as married himself and that he 
had a fine match made up for her, too; and she 


74 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

was to make no delay, for fear the boy might 
change his mind, and go off without waiting to see 
her. 

Julia came on at once. And when she saw how 
things were shaping, of course she had a good deal 
to say at first. But then she bethought her that 
she might do worse than settle herself. She was 
getting on in years. And the cousins that she had 
been with in Dublin used to be talking about old 
maids, and that bachelors must be very scarce in 
Ardenoo ! It was more than ever Mickey expected 
that she would give in so easily as she did, without 
making any great objection to Peetcheen, who, of 
course, was no great things for one of the Heffernans 
to take up with. But she gave in to take him. 
Heffernan and Peetcheen sprung the thing on her 
suddenly, and she was taken unawares, as you’ll 
see it done with a baulking horse. You can trick 
him into taking a jump that he has refused many a 
time before, if you bring him up to it without his 
knowing what you want. 

Mickey had the wit to make the best of Peet- 
cheen, by advancing him the price of a new suit of 
clothes, and tan boots and even gloves, to be 
married in. He wasn’t able to get them on, the 
gloves, I mean. But they had a very neat appear- 


The “Rest of Him” 


75 


ance. Maybe they gave Julia more satisfaction 
than anything else that her fortune was spent on. 
For of course it was out of her money that Mickey 
paid for the fine clothes for Peetcheen. 

The wedding passed off all right, and Mickey 
behaved very well, and threw in a jennet and cart, 
along with the money and the two heifers. And 
he allowed Julia to load up the cart with any 
mortal thing she chose to lay claim to in the place ; 
even to the churn and the griddle. He did that, 
the way she would have no excuse for coming back 
and maybe making unpleasantness when he’d 
have his own woman at the Furry Farm. 

It was a satisfaction to him to know that there 
would be a good few miles between him and the 
sister, once she was Mrs. Peetcheen. And when he 
saw them safely started, Peetcheen driving the 
heifers, and Julia sitting upon a stool in the cart, 
with all the things round her, “Glory be! I never 
thought to get shut of her so simple!” said 
Heffernan. “But God help poor Peetcheen, I 
pray!” 

Peetcheen would have been surprised, if he had 
heard that word said. It was only too contented 
he was, and he stepping out very proudly. The 
new clothes would hardly hold him and his satis- 


76 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

faction, when he thought of how well he was doing 
for himself. 

“What will the neighbours say to me now?” 
he was thinking, “going off the way I did, too 
thankful to any one that would give me a day’s 
work ! And look at me now ! with the two beasts, 
and the wife and all! Sure, it’s little I ever 
thought to see the day I’d have such things!” 

And then he made up his mind that he would 
try not to be too uppish with the old friends, when 
they would be passing him the time of day. He 
determined to answer them very nice and civil, 
when they would ask him, “How’s yourself, 
Peetcheen, and how’s the rest of you?” 

Then he began to think of the old mother, and 
that he would like to make her comfortable. A 
new shawl, he thought ; and how well she could sit 
in the big arm-chair that was the full-up of the cart 
that Julia was driving, very nearly. 

He turned to look at it, because he was in front 
of the cart with the cattle, and the jennet was 
slow, with all the big load that was on her. Still, 
Peetcheen thought the whole thing was just behind 
him. But behold ye! sight nor light of cart, or 
jennet, or Julia even he couldn’t see! It was as if 
the ground had opened and swallowed them down ! 


The “Rest of Him” 


77 


He did not know what in the wide world to 
think. There he stood, looking up the road and 
down the road . . . as if Julia could be coming 
any way except after him ! for how could she have 
got on ahead without his knowing? But that was 
Peetcheen all over. 

He thought he never saw anything so lonesome 
and silent as the same road, lying still before and 
behind him, and white with dust. It was the 
summer season of the year. 

“If I go back,” thought he to himself, “I’m 
very apt to be missing her at some cross-roads! 
It’s what she has took the wrong turn at one 
of them, and not too far back ... it can’t be! 
for it’s not long since she got me to steady the 
churn-dash in the back of the cart, the way it 
wouldn’t be prodding into her back. The first 
man she meets will set her right. In any case, 
I’d have little to do, to go look for her ...” 
(and indeed Peetcheen was right there!) “for I’d 
have to take the two little heifers with me. And 
that might be putting a couple of miles more travel- 
ling on them. They’ll be slaved and tired enough, 
against I have them home. And if I was to leave 
them here by themselves, while I’d be going back 
for her, mightn’t I be summonsed? That wouldn’t 


78 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

answer! No! it’s better for me to wait here and 
see won’t she come along all right. And there is 
lots of good grass, that the cattle can be having a 
little fossick 1 for themselves and a rest.” 

Peetcheen was right in this. There was plenty 
of feeding for the beasts there, going to loss, that 
they might as well have. Besides, when two 
people go astray from one another, the best chance 
they have of coming together again is for one of 
them to stop still. Peetcheen was thick in the 
wits, but he thought of this. Besides, to do 
nothing was the easiest for him. So he just sat 
down on a fine dry heap of stones that was lying 
there ready for the road-contractor, filled his 
pipe, and began to smoke. He might as well. 

He had not finished that pipe altogether, when 
he heard the sound of wheels. Along came the 
jennet, and Julia hard at work, prodding him with 
the point of her umbrella, with her face very red, 
and her hair all every way. It didn’t cool her a 
bit, to see Peetcheen sitting at his ease, with his 
pipe, in the shade of a fine ash-tree. 

“Where were you at all,” he said, getting up 
quite slowly off the stones; “and what ailed you, 
to be so long after me upon the road? ” 


1 Feed. 


The “Rest of Him” 


79 


“What ailed me, indeed!” said the wife; 
“much you care! Stravaguing on there in front 
of me, without a thought of what was becoming 
of me and the jennet. And I bawlin’ me livin’ 
best when I got to the cross-roads, and couldn’t 
get you to hear! How was I to know which way 
you went? Faith, I was in two minds to go off 
back home again! only for you having the two 
little heifers ! And you lettin’ on not to hear me ! 
Is it deaf you are, along with everything else? 
And then the jennet, to take and go stop on me, 
and I with the full-up of me lap of me good cups 
and saucers, so that I wasn’t able to stir, to get 
any good of the beast ! And then he gives a h’ise, 
and me fine big crock, that I have this ten years 
and was bringing it with me, got bruk in two 
halves ! And you, standin’ there, with yer mouth 
open . . . !” 

As if shutting his mouth would mend her 
crockery! But it vexed Julia the more, that 
Peetcheen said nothing. 

“To the mischief with the whole of them! and 
you, too!” she said, then; and began flinging the 
rest of the crockery at Peetcheen, as hard as she 
could; at least, that was what she thought of. 
But of course she didn’t hit him; a woman never 


8o 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

does ; the thing she aims for is the last thing she’ll 
strike. But she fired one after the other, pell- 
mell, till she had all the cups smashed. And what 
else could she expect of cups flung about like that? 
I don’t know; only when she saw them in bits, she 
turned queer, and dropped down into the bottom 
of the cart, and began to laugh and cry all to- 
gether, as if she was mad. 

The sight of this cowed Peetcheen. He stooped 
down, and began turning over the bits of crockery, 
to see if e’er a one of them had escaped. But no ! 
Not a cup or plate of all Julia’s set but was broken 
into smithereens. 

Peetcheen still said nothing. He took the 
jennet by the head, started the cattle on again, 
and followed himself with the cart. 


Now, I must explain that this wedding took 
place so suddenly, that no more than what we call 
in Ardenoo a “sketch” of it had gone round among 
the people. And even that had not reached old 
Mrs. Caffrey at all. So that she had not had the 
slightest warning of what to expect, at the very 
time that Peetcheen and the wife were making 
their way towards her. 


The '‘Rest of Him” 


81 


It was late in the day. She and Dark Moll were 
out — sitting by the roadside, watching a clutch of 
young ducks just out of the shell, when they heard 
a noise, and looked round, to see, first the two 
heifers, and then the jennet and cart, with Peet- 
cheen leading them, and Julia seated up in state, 
driving along. She had come to pretty well by 
that time. People that have tempers are often 
like that. They’ll be mad one minute, and abusing 
you into the ground, and before you have had time 
to take in all they were saying, they are ready to 
forget it, and be quite agreeable again. Moreover, 
they expect you to do the same, which is not so 
simple a matter as they think. 

However, Peetcheen was very peaceable. As 
was usual with him, he had never made Julia an 
answer. She had quieted down by degrees, so 
that now he was enabled to explain the thing to his 
mother with some appearance of comfort. 

The poor mother ! She couldn’t believe her eyes 
nor her ears either almost, when she saw this pro- 
cession drawing up before her door, and Peet- 
cheen saying, “Well, mother! here I am! back to 
you! and bringing in a new dauther, in the place 
of all them that’s gone off ‘on’ you. Her and me 
is after getting marrit!” he ended. 

6 


82 


The Folk of Furry Farm 


Mrs. Caffrey stared at him, and then at Julia 
and all the belongings she had around her. But all 
she could get out was, “She’s kindly welcome in 
these parts!” before she fell into a kind of a weak- 
ness, and staggered, so that Peetcheen had to go 
forward to help her back into the house, while the 
wife was busy seeing to the things she had in the 
cart. 

Dark Moll was looking on at all this, but no one 
took much notice of her. So by that she guessed 
that she was not wanted there, and made up her 
mind to slip away. She gathered up her little 
possessions, and went off at once to another stop- 
ping-place she had, not far away. And that is how 
it happened that no one knew much at first about 
what had taken place, when the new Mrs. Caffrey 
appeared upon the scene, or how the old woman 
took to the notion of a daughter-in-law in her 
home. 

But Moll took the first opportunity of making 
her way back to the Caffreys’; and blind and all 
as she was, there was not a pin’s-worth about the 
place that she could not tell about, and give as good 
an account of it all as if she had the full use of her 
eyes. 

“The new woman that Peetcheen’s after bring- 


The “Rest of Him” 83 

in g home, is it?” she said; “a very agreeable- 
spoken person she is!” 

Julia could be all that when she chose. 

“Butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth, I believe, ” 
said Big Cusack, who was talking to her. He was 
as proud as Punch to know that Julia was gone out 
of the Furry Farm. For then he thought there 
need not be much delay about Heffeman’s own 
marriage; and Cusack had a niece of his own, 
Kitty Dempsey by name, that he wanted to make 
up a match for. Kitty was only a young slip of 
a thing, but there was a bit of land she was to 
come in for; and her Uncle Cusack, being an 
experiented man, thought Heffeman would be 
more suitable for her, nor any young boy, on that 
account. 

“She’s as sweet as you please, that wife of 
Peetcheen’s, by all a body hears,” he went on; 
and then he added, “but there’s such a thing as 
being too sweet to be wholesome! She’s none too 
young, either! A chicken her age won’t die with 
the pip!” 

“No,” said Moll, “nor tear in the plucking! 
But sure, a boy like Peetcheen couldn’t be too 
partickler ! ” 

“You’re right there,” says Big Cusack; “and 


84 


The Folk of Furry Farm 


he wid a head upon him that you’d think should 
fizz, if he put it into could water, it’s that red! 
And the mouth of him ! the same as if it was made 
wid a blow of a shovel ! Isn’t he great, that got a 
wife at all ! let alone the forchune. And has the 
two heifers at grass on my farm ; and persuades the 
wife that the field they’re grazing on belongs to 
himself! Peetcheen may be slow, but he’s no 
such a fool as the people make him out!” 

That was how Cusack spoke of him ; and indeed, 
it was wonderful, all the praise you’d hear of 
Peetcheen now, very different from what it was 
before he went away, when every one would be 
making a hare of him. He himself would walk 
about, very important, going over to “have a look 
at the stock,” as if that would make them fatten 
any faster. And the way he would give a cock to 
his caubeen when he’d meet a neighbour, and pass 
the time of the day with him ! And on a Sunday , 
to see him yoking up the jennet, to drive to Mass, 
feeling as good as the best! In fact, after a bit, 
the neighbours began to laugh at him again. It 
might have been jealousy. 

“Cock him up, indeed!” Big Cusack said, when 
he had time to take this all in; “letting on he’s a 
gintleman, all out, Peetcheen is! with nothing to 


The “Rest of Him” 


85 


do, only ait his food ! And in troth, the sorra long 
it will take them, to ait whatever forchune the 
wife brought into the place! It wasn’t much, I’ll 
go bail! There never was a Heffeman yet that 
would part money without a wrangle for it; and 
Mickey the same!” 

All this was true ; but nothing seemed to trouble 
Peetcheen. He spent the time the way I tell you ; 
never appearing to imagine there was any necessity 
for him to do anything more than that. 

But he had the wife to reckon with. She was of 
a very different way of thinking, and she very soon 
let him know her mind. 

“What way is this to be going on?” she would 
say, “for a man to be at home here under a body’s 
feet from morning to night, as if the place wasn’t 
small enough, and in partickler since I brought 
me own good fumicher into it! Hard-set I’ll be, 
ever to get meself used to the likes of this house 
you brought me to!” 

Julia was right enough in saying this. The 
Caffreys’ place was very small and poor, compared 
to the Furry farmhouse, where she was reared. 
And her things did crowd it up. The big chair 
alone took up the whole side of the fire. But as 
well as that, she was only saying what was true, 


86 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

when she spoke of Peetcheen sitting at home all 
day, as he had the fashion of doing. 

When she would attack him about this, and 
ask him, if there was no job wanting to be done 
about his own place, why wouldn’t he go look for 
work with a neighbour, Peetcheen always had an 
answer ready. 

“Sure there’s no work going, these times! I 
must wait till the haymaking comes on. Then 
there will be good pay to be earned. The meadows 
is nigh-hand ripe this minute!’’ 

So they were; Julia could see that for herself. 
But when Peetcheen went to Big Cusack to ask 
for a job at the hay, he heard that all the work 
had been laid out, and no more hands were needed. 

“And didn’t I think, ” said Cusack to him, “that 
you were too big a man, all out, now, to take a fork 
in your fist ; and you with the rich wife and all! ” 

Peetcheen made no answer to this. He just 
went over to a shady spot, and sat down there, to 
watch the work going on ; went home to his dinner, 
and then back with him to the hay -field, till quit- 
ting- time that night. 

That contented Julia. And when she asked him 
for his week’s pay from Big Cusack, to go to the 
Shop, he saw no occasion to explain to her that 


The “Rest of Him” 


87 


it was out of her own money, that Heffernan had 
handed to him in the old stocking, that she was 
getting it. It satisfied her, and a man will do a 
great deal for peace and quietness. 

What you do once, comes very easy the next time. 
By this kind of management, Peetcheen put the 
next few months over him very nice and handy. 
Haymaking, and harvest, and turf -cutting, all 
happened along for his convenience. He could go 
off, when any of them were on, and lob about 
through the neighbourhood. I won’t say that he 
never did a tap of work; he might, have, now and 
then. But it was seldom the like happened to 
him. 

This was all well and good, as far as Peetcheen 
himself was concerned. But Julia was the sort 
of woman that never can be easy. No ! and what’s 
more never can let any one else be, either. So 
when Peetcheen kept out of her way, and she hadn’t 
the excuse of him and his ways, she began to turn 
on the poor old mother. A stirring, active little 
woman she was herself. Julia would have the 
kettle boiling and the tea wet, while another would 
be thinking of where to look for a bit of firing. 
But if she was quick itself, that was no reason for 
her to go on the way she did to old Mrs. Caffrey. 


88 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

“Give me that besom, here!” she said to her 
one morning, snatching the broom out of the old 
woman’s hand, and giving her a shove towards 
the door ; “ be off out, and gether some kindling for 
the fire ! that work is all you’re fit for ! Sick and 
tired I do be, looking at ye; and you not done 
sweeping the flure yet!” 

“God be wid the time I was young and strong; 
and able to sweep a flure wid any one!” says 
Peetcheen’s mother. 

“It’s a long time ago, if ever you were!” said 
Julia. “Be off wid yourself now, and see can ye 
meet the higgler, and get him to come and buy 
them ould hens of yours! Sorra bit can I give to 
me own good Longshanks and Speckled Humbugs 
but what them ould scarecrows of yours has it all 
ett on them!” 

“There’s no price goin’ now for ould hens, ” said 
old Mrs. Caffrey; “and besides, I’m thinking it’s 
what they have a mind to go lay . . . and eggs 
dear. ...” 

“They’ll lay none here, whether or which!” 
Julia said; “lay, indeed! They wouldn’t know 
an egg, if they saw one!” 

“There’s one tidy little hayro of a hen, her with 
the top-knot, that I’d have a great wish for. . . . ” 


The “Rest of Him” 


89 


“Don’t mind your wishing! they’ll all go; so 
now, mind what I’m telling ye!” said Julia. And 
so they did. 

“Bitther and wicked wid her tongue she is!” 
old Mrs. Caffrey would say; but only to herself. 
She wouldn’t fret Peetcheen for the world, the 
poor boy ! 

To give Julia her due, she was, as Dark Moll said, 
“a most notorious rairer of fowl of every descrip- 
tion.” She had money from the higgler laid by 
already. But because she was lucky herself was 
no reason for her to jeer at the old woman, when a 
while afterwards, the little ducks that were out 
just the day Julia came there all died, one after 
another. 

“What else could you expect, and they June 
birds? ” she said. “No one only a born fool would 
try to have them hatched then!” 

Julia was right there, and in many another 
notion that she brought with her from the Furry 
Farm. But people don’t always care so very much 
for new ways being forced on them. Peetcheen 
and his mother above all were not fond of changes. 
Julia would have a dinner of a Sunday that, as she 
said, “a lord might be proud to sit down before!” 
a pig’s face on a bolster of greens, it might be, or 


90 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

something like that. But no one would have much 
wish for it, because there would always be so much 
argument and scolding over it all. 

They would have had far more comfort in the old 
times, with nothing better than potatoes and salt, 
and maybe a bit of bacon or a salt herring, by way 
of “kitchen. ” Old Mrs. Caffrey would give you a 
pleasant word with whatever she was sharing round 
and that helps out a short dinner ; what mostly was 
what she had, God help her ! 

However, it was Julia that ruled the roast at 
Caffreys’ the time I speak of, and the rest of them 
had just to make the best of it. And it’s a true 
saying, “Money makes the mare to go!” Of 
course every one had to give in to Julia on account 
of the fortune she had. 

Peetcheen stood it out pretty well, as long as 
there was a penny at all left in the old stocking. 
But when the baby came, the money had to be 
handed out very free. Before he knew where he 
was, the stocking was empty; and Peetcheen, as 
usual, without a job. Not that that was any great 
heart-break to him. 

He was stravaguing along the road one evening 
by himself, with the pipe in his mouth. It was 
lovely weather ; the birds all singing, and the grass 


The “Rest of Him” 


9i 


getting long and green on every side. He was 
turning over in his mind about the potato-patch 
he had; how would he get to pay for the seed? 
and weren’t the weeds very high in it? and would 
he have to go work in it himself? when he saw 
Dark Moll, sitting by the side of the road, very 
comfortably. Of course he stopped and began to 
pass the time of day with her. 

“How’s all wid ye, Peetcheen?” asks Moll; 
“and above all, the woman that owns ye? And 
the young son? and a darling fine boy he must be, 
by all I can hear!” 

“They’re well, I thank you and God, ” answered 
Peetcheen; “and me mother, that proud out of the 
child ! Y ou’d think no one ever had a child before, 
and she after rairing ten of her own! And this 
minute, she’s leppin’ mad to begin again!” 

“Ay! there’s the way!” said Moll. 

Peetcheen smoked on a bit; and then says he, 
“A terrible expense this is, on a man!” 

“You may say that, agra!” said Moll; though 
well she knew in her heart that there had been no 
christening worth mentioning at Caffreys’. The 
old woman was all for a bit of a spree, but Julia 
would not hear of it; “spending the money on 
foolishness that could be put to better use!” was 


92 


The Folk of Furry Farm 


what she said. The neighbours knew well how 
it was. But Moll didn’t want to pass any remarks 
about the thing, seeing she might be looking for 
help to the Caffreys, any day; and it wouldn’t 
answer to be offensive. So she only went on to 
say, “Sure the likes of you needn’t mind a few 
shillings, here nor there, when it’s the first, and a 
son ! And you with them fine bastes at grass. . . . 
I hear they’re the talk of the town, and a fine price 
they’d go at the fair to-morrow, if it was a thing 
you’d have a mind to go sell them there. ” 

Moll said all this, because she felt vexed with 
Julia, not being asked to the christening, such as it 
was. Besides, from the start, Julia let her see very 
plain that she didn’t want her coming about the 
house whenever she fancied, and taking up a seat 
in the chimney-corner, as she had the fashion of 
doing. And Moll did not like getting the cold 
shoulder that way, no more than any of us would; 
and she missed Caffreys’, having been so used to it. 
Still, she had no meaning in what she had said 
about the fair and the stock, and all that. But 
see what came of that word ! 

Peetcheen bid Moll the time of day, and went on. 
It was to Big Cusack’s he was making his way, 
thinking he might happen on a job there, or settle 


The “Rest of Him’ 


93 


something about help to do his own work. But 
the Big Man was from home. Peetcheen could 
have found that out, without going there, only 
he never thought of inquiring. So then he wavered 
off to Melia’s, thinking that he might meet some 
one there that would give him an advice about the 
thing. 

He found a few comrade boys of his in the she- 
been, playing Twenty-five. He joined in, with 
whatever few coppers he had left. It took a long 
time, before they finished their game, so that it was 
pretty late when he got home. But that was all 
the wrong he did. He had no drink taken. There 
wasn’t a hair turned on him, when he walked into 
the house, so why Julia should be so raging mad 
with him, no one could tell. But she was and 
abused him up and down the banks ; called him all 
the fools she could lay her tongue to ; and still in all 
Peetcheen never said a word back to her. 

But at last he got worn out, and left the house, 
thinking she might have a better chance to quiet 
down if he wasn’t there. So he turned back to 
Cusack’s, and spent the night in the Big Man’s 
barn. 

Before he settled off to sleep, he had time to 
think over all that was after occurring; the wife 


94 


The Folk of Furry Farm 


to be so contrary with him, and all for nonsense, as 
a body might say. And then he considered over 
how short the money was with him; and where 
would he turn for the next few shillings Jul a would 
be wanting from him. And then he got onto 
remembering what Dark Moll was after saying. 

He fell asleep, however, before very long; and 
wakened up bright and early, with a great plan in 
his head. 

This was, that he would drive off one of the 
two heifers that he had got in Julia’s fortune, to 
the fair that Dark Moll was after reminding him 
of; and a big price she brought. But Peetcheen 
and the likes of him often have great luck. 

After that had come to pass, a strange thing 
happened. For what Peetcheen did with himself, 
or with the money that the people standing by saw 
him getting paid into his hand, was more than 
any one at Ardenoo knew, for many a long day, if 
ever they did. He just disappeared, so he did, as 
if the Good People took him out of it. 

“ Isn’t it a fright, all out, ” the neighbours would 
say, “to see how a decent quiet man like Peetcheen 
could go out of that, and not one be able to give 
any account of him to the wife or the poor ould 
mother!” 


The “Rest of Him” 


95 


Julia was most outrageous; at first very angry, 
and then took to fretting. But the old woman was 
twice as bad. God help her! she grew to be like 
nothing so much as a ha’porth of soap after the 
week’s washing. 

She was out along the road one day, with the 
baby in her arms, when Dark Moll happened along, 
and of course began to chat; why not? 

“And so that’s Peetcheen’s first, is it?” she says; 
“let me feel him in me arrums! och, the weight 
of him! the darlint fine lump of a gossoon that he 
is! Well, and how’s all goin’ on wid yiz these 
times!” 

“Not goin’ on at all!” says Mrs. Caffrey; 
“heart-scalded I do be, wid the frettin’ and annoy- 
ance and thinkin’ that it’s murthered me poor boy 
must be, and he wid the price of the heifer in his 
pocket!” 

“Och! murthered-how-are-ye ! ” says Moll, very 
confident in herself; “no! no such a thing! It’s 
what he has went off to America! He’ll be 
sendin’ yous back plenty of money out of it, I’ll 
go bail!” 

“Do ye tell me that?” said the mother, bright- 
ening up as Moll talked on about it all. The old 
woman was getting a bit hard of hearing at that 


96 The Folk of Furry Farm 

time; and she took it up that Peetcheen had told 
Moll that he was going. 

“Well, that’s the best I could wish to hear, if 
it’s a thing that he wasn’t going to contint him- 
self here at home with us ; and too sure I am that 
he’ll do well . . . ay, and won’t forget his poor 
mother. ...” 

Julia comes up to them, and whips the child 
from Moll, the same as if she was dirt and not fit 
to touch him. That vexed Moll; small blame to 
her! So when old Mrs. Caffrey began reeling out 
of her all that she imagined Moll had said . . . 
and a bit more that she didn’t say . . . such as 
that poor Peetcheen was working hard there beyant 
to send home money to them, Moll never put her 
right. The old mother related it quite cheerfully, 
thinking it would pacify Julia. But it didn’t. 
You never saw so vexed a person. 

“So, that’s where the price of me fine heifer is 
gone!” said Julia; “and I that had him dead! 
drowned in a bog-hole ... or murthered .... 
Breakin’ me heart I was, about a villyin of the 
soart! Well . . . all I know is, them that thinks 
I’m goin’ to stop here and rair Peter Caffrey’s 
babby for him is in a great mistake! I’ll not do 
it ! I’ll go after him, before I’m many days older ! ” 


The ‘‘Rest of Him” 


97 


“Is it go to America? Sure, woman dear, you’d 
never find him! You might as well go look for a 
needle in a haystack. America is a middlin’ big 
place, mind ye!” said Moll. 

No one knew better than Moll how to get round 
people. She was that clever, she could knot eels, 
the people said. She knew what a foolish notion 
it was of Julia’s, to go off to America; and that 
Julia herself would soon cool on it, if she was let 
alone. So that’s why she contradicted her. 

“Fitter far, ay, and decenter, too, for a woman 
like you to stay where you’re well off, in your good 
home, with Peetcheen’s mother for company, and 
Peetcheen’s babby to be lookin’ at. . . . ” 

“Mind yer own business, and be off about it, 
now!” said Julia, choking with the anger; “what 
call have you to be putting in yer gab here? I 
want no interference from you, or the likes of ye! 
Leave me to manage me own affairs! I’ll see to 
make Peetcheen pay for what he’s after doing ‘ on ’ 
me!” 

And at that, Moll did turn about and waddle off. 
And she never let on but it was a real fact about 
Peetcheen being in America. Sure, maybe she 
believed it herself! A body that does as much 
talking as Moll might get confused betimes. But 


7 


98 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

a few evenings after that, she ventured over to 
Caffreys’ again. She was most anxious to get back 
to that house; so she wanted to find out how it 
was going on with Julia and her American plan. 
She found her, fighting rings round her with the 
old woman, and abusing Peetcheen into the dirt. 

“Sure, what at all! wasn’t it only sthrivin’ to 
better himself he was? ” said Moll ; “a good steady 
poor boy he was, always and ever!” 

It was like oil on lit turf to Julia, to hear her put 
in a good word for Peetcheen. When you want 
the woman to come round, in the case of any little 
difference between her and the husband, you 
should find all the fault you can with him. Then 
you’ll find the wife will wear horns, and stand up 
for her husband, and turn on you. And Moll knew 
that as well as any one. She could see how mad 
Julia would get, when she and old Mrs. Caffrey 
would be all for compassionating Peetcheen, and 
saying how good he was, and all to that. In fact, 
no one could say anything bad that ever he did. 
To be sure, he never did anything, one way or the 
other. 

And now, here was Moll, very full of a letter 
she was after hearing read out by one of the 
neighbours. 


The “Rest of Him” 


99 


“ It was wrote/’ she said,“ by one of the Caffreys, 
cousins of the family here, that are out there so 
long, and doing well, too, they appear to be, by 
what I hear. ...” 

“So they are,” said old Mrs. Caffrey, perking 
up at this account of her son’s people being 
set out to Julia; “and why wouldn’t they? and 
it’s likely to them me poor child wint ! God sind 
him safe!” 

“And Amen to that, I pray!” said Moll; the 
same as if she herself thought it was there he 
was. 

Julia was listening to all this. It made her more 
set than ever about going after Peetcheen. She 
was like the rest of us; only too ready to believe 
what she wanted to believe. She took all this, 
about the letter from the cousins, for proof that 
Peetcheen was really gone to America. 

“And to think he should be out there, with full 
and plenty, I’ll be bound; and me slavin’ here! 
I’ll not do it nor it’s not to be expected that I 
would, either!” 

She was just mad to be off. And there were few 
would miss her in Ardenoo. Even Peetcheen’s 
baby would be far more contented, lying on the 
granny’s knee, or with Dark Moll, than he ever 


ioo The Folk of Furry Farm 

was with his mother. An infant is very easy put 
about; and Julia was very odd and jerky in her 
ways. But, sure she could have had no nature in 
her, or she never would have left the child. 

Julia made no delay, only sold the second heifer 
to Big Cusack. Not much she got out of the thing. 
The two beasts “had themselves ett,” he said, 
“very nearly/’ meaning that nearly the whole 
price was owing to him for their grass. Peetcheen 
hadn’t paid a penny for them, since first he got 
Big Cusack to take them in on his pasture field. 
In fact, Julia was none too well treated in the busi- 
ness of her fortune. It was all gone now, except 
the few pounds she got from Mr. Cusack over the 
heifers. 

But “ Divil’s cure to her!” was what was mostly 
said about her; “why couldn’t she keep a civil 
tongue in her head, and not harish the dacent boy 
out of the place that he was raired in; and the 
father and grandfather before him?” 

Julia of course heard nothing of this. There 
wasn’t one would be willing to draw her tongue on 
them; and anyway, there would be no sense in 
interfering. She never asked advice from man nor 
mortal; so she had no chance of finding out how 
much truth there was in the story about Peetcheen 


The '‘Rest of Him” 


IOI 


being in America. She went off, as soon as she 
could take her passage. 

A few days after she left, “ Glory be ! ” says Dark 
Moll, sitting by the fire, with old Mrs. Caffrey 
opposite to her, and the child asleep on her lap, 
“glory be, there’ll be p’ace and quietness here now, 
anyway! And I’ll come back, never you fear, 
acushla, the way you’ll not be lonesome and fretted 
here wid yourself! Nor be at a short for some 
sinsible person to take the babby out of your 
arrums while you’d be out . . . ” 

But she never finished the sketch she was giving 
of what all she would do. For at that word, old 
Mrs. Caffrey gave a screech that very nearly lifted 
the thatch off the house. 

“Oh, Peetcheen! Peetcheen!” she cried; “and 
is it yourself that’s in it? Come over to meself, the 
way I’ll get a good look at ye! The Lord save us! 
but where wor ye this lin’th of time, at all at all?” 

“What’s all this?” said Moll; “what are you 
sayin’? Is it Peetcheen you think is here? or 
could it be Something Not Right . . . and the 
people saying it was what he should be ‘away’ 
wid the Good People . . . and me a poor 
blind ould woman that can’t know what’s going 


on. . 


102 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

But the same Moll was very hardy, and not 
easily daunted by man nor mortal; just she said 
that wanting to get compassionated. But neither 
Peetcheen nor his mother took any heed of her. 
For it was Peetcheen, right enough! and very 
slaved-looking he was ; with his feet on the world, 
you might say, his brogues were so worn and 
broken. And by that sign, the people thought 
it was on the stray he must have been, ever 
since he went off after selling the heifer at 
the fair. 

But no one ever got much account of the business 
or of what became of the money he had then; 
whether he spreed it all, or if he held on to any of 
it. It was like as if he had brought back some 
of it, anyway. For they had more appearance of 
comfort about them the next winter than ever they 
had before. Peetcheen got a neighbour to draw 
home a nice little bit of turf for the winter, from 
the bog ; and there was a new shawl for the mother, 
for going to Mass. 

Peetcheen, you remember, had that laid out in 
his own mind, when he was on his way home, 
after marrying Julia. And, moreover, the big arm- 
chair, that Julia had put by, above in the room, 
the way it wouldn’t be getting knocked about in 


The “Rest of Him” 


103 


the kitchen . . . and as well, she didn’t want 
Peetcheen to have the comfort of falling asleep in 
it, as many a time he did . . . well, that chair 
was brought back and put in the chimney-corner. 
And many a comfortable snooze Peetcheen took 
in it now, when he would feel inclined to rest him- 
self; a wish he often had. 

He’d sit there of an evening, when the people 
would drop in for a ceilidh , 1 a habit they lost 
while Julia was there. But they came again now, 
and would be very anxious to know all about where 
Peetcheen had been. They got no great satisfac- 
tion. 

“Where was I since?” Peetcheen would say; 
“well, I went as far as Turn-Back! Ah! indeed! it 
is a gay piece out of this, sure enough!” 

Peetcheen wasn’t such a fool but that he could 
hold his tongue, when he chose. And there’s 
many a wise adviser of a person that can’t do 
that, to save their lives. 

“You’ll be getting her back now,” said Big 
Cusack to him; “the Woman, I mane, the Rest 
of ye. . . .” 

He was after hiring Peetcheen then, for the same 
job his father before him had had. Ay, and what’s 

1 Gossip. 


104 The Folk of Furry Farm 

more, Peetcheen managed to hold on to it, from 
that out. 

Peetcheen had the fashion at times, that if he 
didn’t want to answer a question in a hurry, he 
would push the old caubeen down over his face, 
and scratch the back of his head. He did that 
now; and then says he, “I dunno, Mr. Cusack; 
I always h’ard tell, that it’s as good to l’ave well 
alone! And I’d have no wish in life to be inter- 
ferin’ with any wan; let alone with a woman.” 


CHAPTER IV 


A DAYLIGHT GHOST 

Heffernan of the Furry Farm, being lame now as 
well as old, thought it would be the best of his play 
not to go too far to look for the wife he was so 
anxious to bring home, now that he had Julia out 
of the way. And this is how he took the notion 
of seeing whether he could get a daughter of old 
Flanagan’s, a near neighbour of his. And as he 
said to himself, he knew all about those people, 
and what way they were situated, as to their little 
place and all to that. 

“A man needn’t expect any fortune with one of 
his girls,” he thought; “but what of the few 
pounds? The land lies very handy to me own 
farm,” . . . and so it did. Flanagan’s land 
“merined” the Furry Farm; and it was a won- 
der how two places so close together could be so 
different from one another! They both lay upon 
the same range of the Furry Hills. But whereas 
Heffernan’s was low down, and the house facing 
105 


106 The Folk of Furry Farm 

north, so that it seldom got a blink of sunshine, 
the Flanagans had theirs half-way up a slope the 
opposite side, where it had shelter, as well as all 
the sun and south wind there was to be had. In 
fact, it was one of the sweetest little places about 
the whole of Ardenoo. Greenan-more it was 
called, an old name that is said to mean “the big 
sunny parlour,” or something like that. It’s 
likely it got that name put upon it when there were 
people living in the old rath up above at the top 
of the hill behind the house. But of course 
there is nothing of a dwelling there now; nothing, 
only a hollow, with a Lone Thorn growing in the 
middle of it, and nettles and stones. Lonesome 
places, raths are! where the Good People live, 
and their music can be heard, and they themselves 
be seen, by them that are able to do so. 

It would delight you, to look at Greenan-more! 
with the lake lying at the foot of the hill on which 
the house stood. The limestone pushes up there, 
close to the surface, and helps to keep the earth 
warm, so that the grass grows earlier there than it 
does anywhere else about Ardenoo. It’s a sweet 
grass, too. One bite of it is worth more to a beast 
than a full feed off the low, sour bottoms of the 
Furry Farm. 


A Daylight Ghost 107 

The land was different on the two places; the 
houses were different; and the people were differ- 
ent, too. Heffernan’s was well enough, in the way 
of it being comfortable and plentiful; but it was 
lonesome and no great appearance of tastiness 
about it. But Flanagan’s had a snug, bright look. 
The two daughters were always contriving some 
little thing to give it a look. It was all neat and 
clean; with a rose growing over the door, and the 
walls whitewashed to that degree, that when the 
sun shone on them, they would dazzle you, nigh- 
hand. 

“Like a smile upon a rosy face!” Jim Cassidy 
used to think to himself, when he would be taking 
a streel up the hill, of a Sunday or a holiday even- 
ing. And when a boy takes to that kind of talk, 
it’s easy to guess what he has in his mind. 

With Jim, I may as well tell you, it was little 
Nelly Flanagan that he was thinking about; 
though when he’d be there, it was all to chat to the 
old father he had come, by the way of! 

And Nelly that took no more heed of Jim than 
of any other boy about Ardenoo ! What was she, 
only a child ! no more ; as gay and as frolicsome as 
a pet lamb. But still in all, Nelly was very nice, 
and biddable. She would do anything in this 


108 The Folk of Furry Farm 

world wide that the elder sister, Christina, would 
say. And why wouldn’t she? 

Here’s who were living at Greenan-more at that 
time: old Flanagan himself; a real old Sport. 
Not a fair or a funeral, a wake or a wedding in 
all Ardenoo, but he’d make it his business to be 
there; and with him there lived his two girls, 
Christina and Nelly. 

The mother had died soon after Nelly being 
born; had no great comfort with Flanagan, and 
no wish to go on living. So when she felt herself 
to be on the last, all she said was: “I’ll give the 
baby to you, Chrissie!” There’s the pet name 
she had for her. 

And Christina, that was only a little slip of a 
thing, about nine or ten years old, took on at once 
to mind the infant, and was like a little mother to 
her. Those that would be in and out of the house 
said it was most amazing, the way she cared the 
little sister. She was very wise and sensible, and 
as good as she could be, every way. 

In fact, as time went on, the two sisters were 
just made upon each other, as the saying is. They 
were always together; Christina made a baby of 
Nelly and Nelly made a mother of Christina. 
And what caused this the more with them was, the 


A Daylight Ghost 109 

father being the sort he was; taking very little 
heed of anything, only his own amusement. That 
is all right enough, in its way. But it doesn’t help 
you to get on in this world; and I don’t know is 
it apt to do much for you in the next. What 
Flanagan and men like him don’t spend in their 
playing about, they waste in idleness. Christina 
did as much as ever she could. But on a farm, 
there’s always many things that a woman 
can’t do. 

And this is how she began first to be thinking a 
good deal about Jim Cassidy. For he was very 
smart. He would see with half an eye what was 
wrong, and set it right while another would be 
wondering what ought to be done. He was ready 
and willing to do anything in life for them at 
Flanagan’s, so that Christina, that was what we 
call the sense-carrier of the family, got to depend 
on Jim for every hand’s turn that wanted doing 
about Greenan-more ; such as the drawing home of 
the turf from the bog; or getting the hay or oats 
saved, or buying in a couple of young pigs to be 
fattened. Of course, the selling of the stock had 
to be left to Flanagan himself; and that was the 
pity ; and was little good to either him or his girls. 
He would no sooner have the price of the cattle or 


no The Folk of Furry Farm 

sheep or whatever it might be, paid into his hand, 
than he’d go off on a spree, and then you couldn’t 
tell what he’d be up to; as likely as not, never 
come home, till he’d have it spent. 

What the girls had for themselves was anything 
they could make of the butter and eggs, the geese 
and turkeys and so on. They were satisfied 
enough, they didn’t want so much. So was the 
old father, contented in his own way. 

And here again, there was a wide difference 
between them and the Heffernans. Poor Mickey, 
for all his industering, never took much satisfaction 
out of what he worked so hard for; and as for 
Julia, she was so crabbed always, that she used 
never to enjoy her own life, nor let any one else 
enjoy theirs either ; at least, as long as she remained 
in Ardenoo; of course, she might have changed, 
going to America. 

Yes, the Flanagans were peaceful and easy- 
going; all but Christina, that favoured her dead 
mother, and as she got a bit older, used to feel 
anxious betimes about many things. Of course 
this made her all the more ready to look to Jim 
Cassidy for help. Like as if he was a brother, 
she often said to herself. But there’s many a 
brother that wouldn’t be as good-natured to 


A Daylight Ghost in 

a couple of sisters as Jim was in regard to the 
Flanagans. 

Christina having so much dependence out of 
Jim, then, small blame to her, when, one evening 
as she was driving in the cows, and he came up, 
she nearly fell out of her standing, when he said: 

“I’m going off next week!” 

“Going off! A — where, Jim?” she said, though 
she knew well, all the time. There was only the 
one place for a boy like Jim to make for, those 
times. 

“To America! Where else?” said Jim. “The 
uncle that’s there beyant has wrote me word, that 
he has me passage paid, and, moreover, has a good 
job waiting on me. So why wouldn’t I go, and 
not to be stopping on here; pulling the divil by 
the tail for the rest of me days!” 

He stopped at that; and if he’d been looking at 
Christina, instead of staring out over the lake, the 
way he was, he would have seen that she had turned 
as white as a patch of bog-cotton. But he never 
looked at her, only went on to say: “There’s only 
the one thing that I’m sorry for leaving behind 
me ! Sure, what need I care for going ! a boy like 
me, without one belonging to me left now in 
Ardenoo; or indeed the whole of Ireland! Only 


1 12 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

the one thing for me to regret! that’s Greenan- 
more. ...” 

And if he had chanced now to look at Christina, 
he would scarcely have known was it her or Nelly 
that was standing beside him ; for Christina’s eyes 
were dancing, and her cheeks flushed and warm. . . . 

But Jim was still gaping out across the lake, as 
if he had never seen till then the way it shimmered 
and flashed under the setting sun. He saw no- 
thing of the change in Christina, only went on: 
“ Greenan-more ! ay, Greenan-more ! that’s where 
me thoughts will be; that’s what I’m fretting to 
leave behind; where I’d always love to be. . . ! 
But you’ll write to me, Christina ...” 

At the word, Christina felt happiness rising, 
rising like a warm wave about her. . . . 

”... and you’ll tell me about every one, and 
everything that’s going on in the place . . . ” 
Jim stopped a bit there . . . and then, in a 
whisper, “and about Nelly . . . ?” 

Then Christina felt the wave die down, and she 
grew cold. Everything suddenly turned black 
and lonesome, all in a minute. She felt giddy, as 
if the world had begun to sink away from under 
her feet. But she said nothing. Indeed, why 
should she? Wouldn’t it be the queer world, if 


A Daylight Ghost 113 

people did what they say they do, and just told 
out whatever they think? They don’t; nor they 
couldn’t; it would never answer. . . . 

All Christina could say, was: “Next week? 
why then, that’s short notice!” 

And Jim helped her to drive the cows into their 
shed, and got her the stool, and she sat down and 
began to milk. Just the way he was always 
helping her! and he stood beside her, for a bit, 
advising her about this thing and that thing; and 
she felt as if it was all a dream. 

But one thing was real enough to her. She 
knew Jim was only delaying there, in the hopes 
of seeing Nelly coming out from the house, to 
help to carry in the milk. And poor Christina felt 
ashamed of the satisfaction it was to her, that as 
likely as not Nelly would forget all about the 
cows, and the dairy, and the evening’s work. 

She had that satisfaction; not a sight of Nelly 
was to be seen. And Jim, after waiting a bit, 
thinking that maybe Christina would be bidding 
him to come into the house, or stay to his supper 
there, just went off home to wherever he was 
stopping. 

He had short notice, sure enough, for so long a 
journey. But what matter for that? If you have 


1 14 The Folk of Furry Farm 

little, you travel light. Christina, that was always 
busy at some industering, had a grand lot of stock- 
ings of her own spinning and knitting, ready to put 
into his bundle. Nelly had nothing, and she cried 
down tears to turn a mill, over that. But Chris- 
tina had the fashion still, when she would go to 
the Shop, that she’d bring home a lucky-bag to 
Nelly, as if she was a child still. She did that, 
the very day before Jim started. And what was 
in the lucky-bag, but a grand breast-pin, that had 
a stone in it, shining like a diamond, only of course 
it couldn’t be that! Nelly offered the pin to Jim 
for a keepsake, and he was as proud as if it really 
was a diamond she had for him. 

Jim went off, and of all the friends he left behind 
him you’d think Christina cared the least. But 
there’s many a one like that. They’ll be able for 
the day’s work, and will keep bright and busy; 
ay, and have a smile and a pleasant word for 
every one. But underneath all that, there’s some- 
thing aching, aching . . . ! unknown to all the 
world, except themselves. 

It’s like the “swally in ’-holes” you come on now 
and then in the boggy bits of Ardenoo. You may 
be walking along, happy and contented, in the 
sunshine, making your way through heather and 


A Daylight Ghost 115 

brambles and fern; sweet smells coming up to 
you from the bog-myrtle and meadow-sweet ; and 
suddenly with a gasp you stop short! There at 
your feet, you’ll see a gaping hole, half hidden by 
moss and rushes . . . and when you look down, 
far, far below the warm, smiling surface of the bog, 
you see water, black and deep and silent. 

“It’s not me, at all; it’s Nelly he wants!” 
Christina kept saying to herself, always, always, 
while she’d be going about her work, up and down, 
early and late, as busy as ever she could be. Busier 
than ever, indeed ! It seemed now as if she never 
could rest, and couldn’t be easy, unless she was 
doing something, for the old father, or little 
Nelly. 

It’s dreadful, when you have to look on, at some 
one else getting the very thing that you would give 
your heart’s blood for! Ah, dreadful! even if it’s 
some one you love that’s robbing you. And it 
makes it no better, if the one that’s getting what 
you want is maybe not caring two straws about it ; 
not even knowing it’s there to be had. Nelly 
didn’t; she had no more notion of Jim and how he 
felt than the man in the moon. Christina could 
not have held out at all if she had known. 

I won’t say that Nelly didn’t feel a bit lonesome 


n6 The Folk of Furry Farm 


for Jim. She missed him coming about the place, 
as he had the fashion of doing. But she never 
thought much of anything, and she was so beauti- 
ful and so nice every way, that she could not but be 
happy. Why, when she’d be going to the chapel of 
a Sunday, the boys would be striving with one 
another to get where they could have the full of 
their eyes of little Nelly Flanagan. And a girl 
can’t but know something of what goes on in that 
way ; and feel it a satisfaction, too. There wasn’t 
one in Ardenoo could hold a candle to Nelly in 
point of looks. Christina was well enough, too, a 
very fine appearance of a girl she was, no doubt. 
But she was older and more settled in her ways, 
than Nelly, hadn’t the same happy, laughing looks 
and little tricks and fun. How could Christina 
be like that and she with the weight of the work on 
her shoulders always, not to speak of the care of 
Nelly, from the time she was born! It had made 
her very quiet and grave in herself; as if she had 
left youth behind her, long ago, though in years 
what was she but a girl still? 

Jim wasn’t very long gone off, when what hap- 
pened, only old Flanagan took and died on the two 
poor girls. And you would wonder to see how they 
lamented him; and he so little use to them, or 


A Daylight Ghost 117 

indeed to himself either, or any one else, except 
maybe the play-boys that he would be consorting 
with, whenever he had the money to stand treat. 
And small good that was going to be, to them or 
him! 

Still, when any one is gone and laid in the grave, 
there’s no one going to say anything but what is 
good of them; and so by old Flanagan. And of 
course his own girls were the last to hear of any 
little faults or follies he had to do with. That 
made it all the harder on them, when things began 
to be looked into, and it was found out that there 
was a lot of money owing on the farm. The girls 
had always trusted their father, the way women 
mostly do. Christina had felt a bit anxious at 
times, but still, she had managed to keep middling 
straight at the Shop by bringing in her eggs and 
butter and so on, to exchange them against what- 
ever tea and sugar, flour and meal and soap and 
whatever else she wanted in the housekeeping line. 
That was the way the weight of the business was 
done at Melia’s. Christina knew pretty well how 
their account stood there. But she never had 
any intelligence of anything further. The father 
had the notion that many men have, that women 
understood nothing about money, and the less 


n8 The Folk of Furry Farm 

they had to say to it the better. So it was a terrible 
surprise to Christina when she found out, after the 
father died, that there was rent owing on the farm. 
The agent was very easy-going, and had let it run 
on out of good-nature to old Flanagan. But now 
he was beginning to think that the two girls would 
not be a very good mark for all that money. And 
although he talked to them as kind as could be, he 
was beginning to hint to others that maybe girls 
like the Flanagans would be as well off without the 
responsibility of so much land, when there wasn’t 
a man to work it. He really may have thought 
they would be better off in a smaller place. But 
besides that, he knew well that old Heffernan 
would be glad enough to get Greenan-more, be- 
cause it lay so convenient to his own farm; and 
that maybe if he could arrange to let him have it, 
he’d be getting a hand-over for himself. And of 
course he wanted to do the best for himself , like 
the rest of us. 

Christina didn’t understand all these things, but 
she began to feel very downhearted, as if there was 
trouble in store for them, when the next rent-day 
was coming round, and she knew how little 
there was to meet what was due. That was bad; 
but her own care, that no one knew of but herself, 


A Daylight Ghost 119 

was far worse. She could neither eat nor sleep, 
thinking, thinking always. 

Well, she was sitting at the door one evening, 
knitting, when who did she see coming up the hill 
towards her but Mickey Heffernan. She spoke to 
him very civilly, as she always would, but won- 
dered greatly what was bringing him there. For 
it was seldom he took the light from their door, or 
indeed from any other door either. He lived to 
himself, and so he, too, had little notion of what 
was going on about the place. It would have been 
a big surprise to him, too, if any one had told him 
that there was any idea of his getting Greenan- 
more. 

But that nothing to the business he had really 
come about ; a most amazing thing it was ! Chris- 
tina could hardly believe her ears, when at last 
Mickey brought it out. 

It appeared that he had been taking notice of 
Nelly; had had a good look at her, the day the 
father was in his burying. And now, nothing would 
do him, only to see to get her to marry him. 

And he said to Christina: “If I have your good 
word with her, the thing is as good as done; she’ll 
agree to do what you say. And if she does, you’ll 
never regret it! For I’ll regulate things for you, 


120 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

as well as for her. And I needn’t say, my wife’ll 
never want . . . ” and all to that. 

Christina listened to him with a whirling mind. 
All the thoughts that came up before her then! 
She could not separate them from one another. 
There was a bit of a song that kept repeating itself, 
about an old man trying to get a young wife ; and 
why the words went singing themselves through 
her head 

Who plans to wreck a singing voice, and break a 
merry heart, 

He calls a curse that shall be his, until his breath 
depart — 

she did not know ! She wasn’t even thinking of all 
they meant; only, there they were. But she did 
say to herself that supposing such a thing did come 
about, it might not be altogether too bad. Isn’t 
it often said, “ Better be an old man’s darling than 
a young man’s slave”? And Heffernan was well 
known to be a good sort: kind and sober and 
honest, queer and odd though he was in his ways. 
Ay, and he was what is known as a “warm” man; 
one that had full and plenty, to bring a wife home 
to. And Christina felt the comfort it would be to 
have him for a friend to herself ; and she knew the 


A Daylight Ghost 12 1 

need there was for some one to stand between her 
and the world. She was like most women: very 
timorous about money that was owing, and above 
all, about rent being behind. 

Then she thought, Nelly had never passed any 
remarks about Jim; no more than any ordinary 
friend might. She was full as careless and gay as 
when he went away. When Jim would write . . . 
and it was seldom he did, the letter was always to 
Christina. He would ask for Nelly, right enough; 
but sure the weighty end of American letters is 
always asking for this body and that body. Jim 
Cassidy’s were the same. Every one of the neigh- 
bours would be mentioned byname. It would have 
only seemed more particular if there had been 
nothing at all about Nelly. 

So Christina had said to herself, that there was 
no occasion to be making any talk with Nelly about 
Jim at all. Mightn’t he change his mind? or never 
come back . . . ? And now, when Heffernan 
had his say about Nelly, Christina was sure it was 
just all for the best she had never said a word to 
Nelly about what Jim had said to her. It would 
only have been disturbing her mind. 

Christina was all in a flutter, sitting there, with 
the knitting idle in her lap for once, and Heffernan 


122 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

just waiting, and not a word more out of his head. 
And still . . . what ought she to say? what ought 
to be done? 

At last she said, “ Nelly’s not in at this moment. 
Away at a bit of a dance she is, down at the cross- 
roads. ...” 

She stopped there, thinking maybe Heffernan 
would be put off his plan, by hearing that about 
Nelly, and the father only so lately dead. And 
Christina left to do the whole business that evening 
by herself. Not that she minded that. She never 
grudged Nelly her fun. But she wondered if 
Heffernan would blame Nelly. 

“Not inclined for going she was,” she went on, 
“but I made her go, and I’ll slip off by and by, 
to bring her home ; sure, she’s young, the crature ! ” 

“She’ll mend of that!” said Heffernan. 

After another silence, he got up to leave. 

“I’ll not wait any longer to-night, ” he said, “ but 
if it would be agreeable, I’ll drop round next Sun- 
day, when there will be nothing else to be done. 
We can settle the thing then at once. ” 

“Mind, you’ll have to speak to Nelly herself 
first!” said Christina. By that she was trying to 
make herself believe that she was giving Nelly a 
chance of thinking of Jim. 


123 


A Daylight Ghost 

But only God knows what is in people’s minds! 
Surely, half the time we don’t know ourselves. 
And the very things that are the most in our 
thoughts are the things we get ourselves the most 
confused over. And the more we try to see them 
clearly, the more confused we get. 

With Christina, anyway, that’s how it was. 
Sleeping or waking, it was Jim, Jim, Jim! always 
and ever; no matter what she was doing, or who 
was there. What was he doing now? Was he just 
the same? And was he really and truly as fond of 
Nelly as he had seemed to be that evening? . . . 
And did Nelly care one thraneen about him? 

But she did want to act fairly by them both! 
And that was why she had said to Heffernan that 
he must speak to Nelly herself first; she would 
have no hand in it, until Nelly had had time to 
think. She wouldn’t say a word to her, good, bad, 
nor indifferent, she thought. 

“Whatever you say, I’ll agree to,” Heffernan 
said, the last thing as he was waddling off; “but 
sure she’ll do as you bid her, I’m sure!” 

There’s the way marriages are generally settled 
in Ardenoo. 

The days passed on, and Christina never said a 
word to Nelly still. And then, the very Sunday 


124 The Folk of Furry Farm 


that she was expecting Heffernan to come again to 
Greenan-more, wasn’t there a letter from Jim; 
and most surprising news in it, this time. 

It told that the uncle Jim had gone out to was 
after dying, very suddenly, and had left all he had 
to Jim. This had happened some time before, but 
Jim wouldn’t say anything about it, till he was 
sure. But now the whole thing was settled up. 
He had the money; and he was coming home at 
once. 

Jim coming home! Jim coming home! Chris- 
tina felt wild at the thought ! If he had the money, 
what delay would there be only to ask Nelly, and 
she would have him, fast enough ! The thing was 
as good as done. Nelly was to the good yet, as 
long as there was nothing settled with Heffernan. 
Oh, if only Jim’s uncle hadn’t died so smart! If 
only . . . But must she tell Nelly? Why 
need she tell her? Let her alone! Sorra hair 
Nelly would care! Let her marry Heffernan! 
One was as good to Nelly, Christina really believed, 
as another! She would very soon content herself 
at the Furry Farm . . . and then . . . Oh, 
if only Heffernan would marry her at once, 
and end the thing! If once Nelly was out of 
the way. 


125 


A Daylight Ghost 

But Jim, Jim, that had trusted her with his 
secret ! Christina began to think of this now, and 
that Jim had told her everything, and as good as 
asked her to look after Nelly for him ! Would it be 
fair to Jim? How could she play him such a dirty, 
mean trick, as to keep this news from Nelly, 
knowing all it meant, knowing that Jim intended 
Nelly to hear it? 

She would tell Nelly. Of course she would! 
How could she do anything else but tell her? But 
it appeared as if something always came in the way 
that morning. She started off to find Nelly, and 
read the letter with its wonderful news to her; 
and she couldn’t find her. 

Christina had been to first Mass; and now Nelly 
was off to second Mass, a bit late, as often hap- 
pened her; and hurrying all she could, hoping to 
get a lift on a neighbour’s car .... So she was 
a piece off, down the hill, when Christina called 
to her; and not a foot she’d come back! 

And what was Christina to do? There was the 
letter, burning in her pocket, and never a chance 
of telling about it to Nelly, the one that was most 
concerned; because, when she got back from the 
chapel, she had Heffernan with her, all dressed out 
in his best; and Christina thought it would not 


126 The Folk of Furry Farm 

answer to have any talk of Jim then ; and of course 
no more it would. 

The same thing, while the dinner was going on; 
no opportunity for a word with Nelly. 

“It isn’t to be, now!” Christina said to herself; 
she might indeed have spoken to Nelly, if she had 
really made up her mind to it, but the minute they 
were done eating, Heffernan said, “I may’s well 
have a look at that hay you were telling me about, 
now. And this little girl will show me the way!” 
meaning Nelly. 

“Very well!” said Christina, wondering in her- 
self how cute old Mickey was, to make a chance 
for himself! 

So they got up from the table. Heffernan took 
his stick, that he never could do without, since his 
accident at the fair of Balloch, and there was Nelly 
all smiling, quite ready; and off they went to- 
gether ; December and May. 

Before they were farther than the yard, Chris- 
tina called after them: “ Nelly! Nelly, come here a 
minute . . . ! 

“Ah, for what?” cried Nelly. 

“I . . .1 have something to say to ye!” said 
Christina; and she wished she hadn’t. 

“Oh, won’t it keep?” says Nelly, that had 


127 


A Daylight Ghost 

often been called back that way, to be told how to 
behave, and to not be wild . . . and she had no 
edge on for being lectured then. 

She thought it was bad enough, having to go off 
with Mickey by herself. . . . 

“That’s all right! come along!” said Heffernan. 

He was thinking, the poor old man, that it was 
what Nelly wanted to be hurrying off with him. 

“Mind, now! I told you to listen to me!” said 
Christina, very serious. Yet she was relieved when 
Nelly just laughed and went on to the hayfield. 
And Christina called out, “I’ll be after you, Mr. 
Heffernan, as soon as ever I have the place readied 
up . And glad I ’ll be of an advice about that hay. ’ ’ 

“Och, sure there’s no occasion for you to be in 
too great a hurry ! ” said Heffernan, quite talkative. 

When they were started, “I could do no more!” 
said Christina to herself, looking after them, Nelly 
like a child, frisking along beside Heffernan and 
his limp, and she chattering away to him and 
amusing him. There’s the sort Nelly Flanagan 
was; always ready to please whoever was next to 
her. 

Plenty there are like that ; plenty of girls, pretty 
and pleasant and smiling. But there’s nothing 
more! no more than if it was a picture you had 


128 The Folk of Furry Farm 

hanging by a nail from your wall. But God made 
them, and the men like them. 

As I was saying a while ago, it’s hard to know 
exactly what is in your own mind, let alone in 
another’s. But it’s likely that what Christina was 
really thinking now was this: if once Heffernan 
spoke to Nelly, and got her to pass her word to 
him, the thing would be settled, for good and all. 
Heffernan would get the marriage over at once. 
An old man has no time to lose, courting. Not 
that Mickey was what people in general would 
count as old; only that was how the girls always 
talked about him, he being so very settled and 
quiet-going in every way. 

Along with that, she thought how that Nelly 
would be safe and contented with him. He was 
good, and Nelly was easy-going and hadn’t any one 
else in her mind. Christina was only too ready to 
think that. 

But the great thing was, that if Nelly was out of 
the way . . . mightn’t anything happen, as soon 
as not! Christina did not put that into words, 
even in her own mind. There was one thing sure, 
however. She wanted Jim for herself. But that, 
too, she had to put away from her. The loneliness 
of her! She had not one, in this world wide, to 


A Daylight Ghost 129 

speak to. If she had had itself, how could she! 
how could she! 

As soon as Christina had all done, the dishes 
washed up, and the floor swept over, and a bit 
thrown to the hens, she went off after Nelly and 
Heffernan. She thought she wouldn’t be in too 
big a hurry. The day was hot and bright and she 
would take her time. 

She did that. When she got to the gate 
of the Big Meadow, and looked across it down 
to the lake that lay beyond, she perceived 
Heffernan and Nelly, and they standing, talk- 
ing, with their backs to her, gazing out over 
the water that rippled and flashed under the 
sunshine, just as it was when Jim had told her 
he was going away, and for her to give him 
news of Nelly. 

Christina stopped when she caught sight of them. 
The thing was going on just as she would wish it 
should. She might as well give Heffernan his 
time to say all he wanted. He was slow. It 
would take him a good while to make Nelly 
understand. She laid out that she would go across 
to join them, of course, as she had arranged, but 
very nice and easy, taking her time. She began 
by being very particular about hasping the gate; 


130 The Folk of Furry Farm 


a thing, in troth, that you can hardly be too care- 
ful about, on a farm. 

It gave her some trouble, the gate being loose 
from the hinges, and Christina remembered it was 
a job that Jim had meant to do for her, to set that 
gate right, only he got such short notice about 
leaving for America. When she had it secured 
again, she straightened herself up, and turned 
round, so as to be facing the field she was going to 
cross. What did she see, there half-way between 
herself at the gate, and Nelly at the far end of the 
meadow, only Jim himself! 

The sight left her eyes, near-hand, and small 
blame to her. She rubbed them hard, and looked 
again. There he was, right enough. He was 
laughing, as he had the fashion of doing, a quiet, 
half-shy smile, but saying nothing. It was Jim 
all over. The field was so full of light and heat 
that she felt dazzled. You could see little quiver- 
ing waves rising up into the air from the sun-cocks. 
Christina thought everything was moving before 
her eyes. Except Jim. He stood there, quite 
quiet, laughing still. 

“ Nelly doesn’t see him!” was the first thought 
that came into Christina’s head; “Nelly doesn’t 
see him! and maybe he hasn’t seen her! It’s not 


A Daylight Ghost 131 

that side he’s looking, at all ! It’s towards me he’s 
turned. . . . Och, if only I can keep him that 
way . . . ! till I’ll get down to him . . . and 
keep him in chat ... if only Heffernan had his 
say out with Nelly, and gets her promise. . . . 
Oh, why did Jim come here, just this minute! 
What at all brought him now! If only he’d have 
stayed away another bit! Even an hour . . . 
and not for he to be appearing, till it would be 
settled. . . . An’ Nelly that doesn’t mind one, 
no more than another . . . what does Nelly care!” 

With that word, in a clap, Christina begins to 
think of Jim! Jim, and the look in his eyes, 
straight and full of longing and misery, while he 
was beseeching of her to write him word of every 
one . . . “ and Nelly!” 

It takes a long time to tell a thing, but you’ll 
make up your mind quick enough. Christina had 
hers determined, before she had made her way 
actoss the warm, smiling aftermath to the first line 
of sun-cocks. 

Supposing Nelly didn’t care! Jim did. It was 
like a blow on a bruise for Christina to have to feel 
that this was true. But when she did, and saw 
what ought to be done, she lost no time. 

‘‘Jim!” she called out; and when he made no 


132 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

answer, “Jim!” again. Still he said nothing; 
only stood there, laughing. So then she shouted 
out, “Nelly! Nelly! look-at-here. See who’s in 
it!” 

At the word, Nelly turned round, and in a second 
there she came, flying like a bird up the field, the 
sun shining on her shining hair, and her pink skirts 
floating this way and swelling that way, as she ran, 
and kept calling out, “Jim! Jim! is it yourself 
that’s in it, at all at all?” 

She was like a bird, as I said, but a bird that was 
taking wing from a cage. 

To tell the truth, she wasn’t caring so much 
about poor Mickey and his way of courting. She 
was listening to him, because she was too much 
surprised to do anything else, and besides she 
couldn’t really imagine he was in earnest, and was 
just letting him go stuttering on, and half inclined 
to laugh in his face, only she was too kind to do 
the like. ... But of course she’d far liefer 
have a boy more her own age and gait of going to be 
looking out across the lake with, than Heffernan, 
Furry Farm and all. So off she ran from him and 
towards Jim. 

There you have them all; Nelly running lightly 
from one end of the hayfield, and Christina step- 


A Daylight Ghost 133 

ping quickly from the other end of it, and they 
both making for Jim who was standing between 
them. Surely either of them would reach him 
quickly . . . and of course, poor Christina was 
full sure he would go a piece of the way down to 
meet Nelly! But instead of that, he kept backing, 
and backing away from them; laughing always, 
but saying nothing. 

“What are you at, Jim?” said Nelly, flushed 
and out of breath, but radiant with smiles of 
welcome. “Can’t you stop, and not be going on 
that-a-way?” 

Still Jim kept moving, moving away from them; 
sliding across the field, and not a word out of 
his head, in spite of all Nelly could say. Then 
he got to the stone wall that ran round the Big 
Meadow; and then over with him, and Nelly and 
Christina coming after him. 

When they got to the wall, they looked over it 
into the next field ; a big, flat pasture-field it was ; 
broad and open to the blazing sunshine. You’d 
think a mouse couldn’t stir there, without being 
seen. But sight nor light of Jim the sisters could 
not get there. 

“Where is he, at all at all?” said Nelly, her 
cheeks as red as roses between the heat and the 


134 The Folk of Furry Farm 

excitement she was in; “some trick he’s after 
playing off on us! We’ll find him above at the 
house, never fear! And to say he lepped the wall, 
and never stirred a stone off it!” 

The wall was just made of loose stones, laid one 
upon another without mortar. Cattle or sheep 
could knock a gap through them, ready. 

The sisters looked at one another. Nelly 
turned white. 

“Sure, Jim’s always souple, ” said Christina, so 
quietly that you’d never imagine she had a hair 
turned on her; “but now, let you make no delay f 
only turn back to Mr. Heffernan, not to be leaving 
him there with no one only himself . . . sure 
that’s no right way to be going on! Have man- 
ners, child dear!” 

And to herself, Christina was saying, “To think 
she never took notice of the breast-pin, and he with 
it in his tie!” for they were close enough to see it; 
anyway, that pin sparkled in the sun. “ I wonder 
does she remember giving it to him, at all!” 

“Let you come back with me, Chris!” said 
Nelly, coaxing her; as if she was turning shy with 
Mickey, all of a sudden. 

“What nonsense is this to be going on with?” 
said Christina a bit short. But still in all, she 


x 35 


A Daylight Ghost 

went. She scarce ever could refuse Nelly anything 
that she had the giving of. 

And wasn’t it a small thing to do, to walk down 
a piece to meet old Heffernan, compared to what 
Christina was after making up her mind to? 

She was going to give Jim up! I mean, to give 
up thinking about him ; for the bitterest part of the 
thing was, that she had nothing else to give up! 
Why would she come between Jim and what he 
wanted so much? 

“ . . . and Nelly!” he had said; “write me 
about everything that’s going on about the place 
. . . and Nelly!” 

Something had died in Christina at these words. 

To give up Jim! I won’t say it was like parting 
with a bit of herself; for Christina had no such 
great liking for her own four bones, that that 
would have troubled her much. And did anything 
trouble her now? She felt all ice, as if she had no 
feeling left. 

And what was she to do ! What was she to do ! 

It seemed half her life, before they met Heffer- 
nan, coming puffing and limping up the field. 
He hadn’t a word more out of him about the 
business he had in hand, and seemed really vexed 
at the way Nelly had run off from him. 


136 The Folk of Furry Farm 

“Cassidy? Jim Cassidy?” he said, when they 
went to explain the thing to him; “why, what 
at all ! there wasn’t a living soul in the meadow 
nor isn’t now, only our three selves ! Is it want- 
ing to make me out a fool, altogether, yous are? 
Maybe that’s not so easy done!” 

He stopped at that, with his mouth open, as if 
he was surprised at himself that he had said so 
much. He looked from one to another of the two 
girls, as much as to say, “What excuses have yous 
to make to me?” for he was quite offended. And 
when no one said anything, he just turned off short, 
when they reached the gate leading out of the 
meadow, and went home, as crabbed as you like. 

But by that time Christina was past caring a 
pinch of snuff what he did. She could think of 
nothing, only Jim. She thought she’d never get 
back to the house quick enough, she was so full 
sure he would be there waiting for them. 

Leaning out over the half-door, she pictured him 
to herself, the way he often was, before he went 
to America, laughing and kind. Her face was 
white, and the two eyes burning, burning in it, as 
she went hurrying on, across the yard, and into the 
house. 

As for Nelly, she was all smiles and gaiety. 


137 


A Daylight Ghost 

Little she cared for Heffernan, or what humour he 
was in, and he going off from that! She was 
calling out, “Jim! Jim! where at all are you? what 
do you mean . . . ?” as she ran here and there 
looking for him, rosy and warm again in the 
cheeks, as if they were playing a game of hide- 
and-seek. 

But the sorra Jim could they find ! High, low, or 
holy, there wasn’t a sight of him to be seen ; though 
Nelly hunted and searched and looked and called, 
all over the place; while Christina, white and 
hot-eyed, went about her usual work. 

“A body would think you didn’t care, Chrissy, ” 
said Nelly indignantly. 

Care ! Did she care about her chance of heaven ? 

Later in the evening, Nelly went straying off 
through the neighbours, telling her story, about 
Jim being in the Big Meadow, and then going off 
from them. Did This or That body see him? 
Nelly would ask, with wide, innocent eyes. She 
was only laughed at. Nobody saw Jim Cassidy! 
Let her go home and make up some better story 
than that, if she wanted to entertain people. 

“But we did see him! the two of us saw him! 
and we even spoke to him! And he made us no 
answer, only disappeared, the same as if the ground 


138 The Folk of Furry Farm 

had opened and swallowed him down!” Nelly 
insisted. 

“ Maybe so it did, but we’ll not swally your 
story!” was all the satisfaction Nelly got. 

So she went home to Christina and “Ah, Chrissy, 
do you think would it be a warning, and that poor 
Jim just came back to tell us he’s dead, there be- 
yant in America?” said Nelly, beginning to cry 
down tears like the rain. 

But Christina never made her an answer. She 
couldn’t! What Nelly was after saying, was what 
she had been thinking. But such thoughts never 
seem so bad, till some one else puts them into 
words. 

To think of Jim, Jim Cassidy dead! She 
nearly hated Nelly for saying the word that ends 
everything . . . except Love. 

She put her hand into her pocket, and pulled out 
Jim’s letter, and gave it to Nelly. 

“That came this morning, and I never got the 
chance of showing it to you all day, till now,” 
she said. And she kept watching N elly from under 
her eyelashes, to see would she mind it much. 

But Nelly was a real child. She never thought 
of anything, except just what a body would put 
before her in words. She said nothing as she took 


A Daylight Ghost 139 

the letter and read it. There was nothing in it, 
only about he coming home; and the money he 
was after getting by the uncle that died. 

Then : “ Starting the day week this was wrote ! ” 
she said. “Well, well! But sure he couldn’t be 
here yet, this len’th of time . . . ! whether or 
which. ...” 

And then she gave a look at Christina, but she 
was as busy as a nailer with one little thing or 
another about the kitchen, so that she took no 
notice of the way that Nelly was staring her. And 
maybe it was as well that Nelly got no encourage- 
ments to say, what was on the tip of her tongue, 
how that Christina appeared noways glad or in- 
terested at the thoughts of Jim coming home. 

“And the luck that he’s after happening on! 
And they two that were always the greatest of 
friends!” 

That was what Nelly said to herself. But she 
never kept anything long in mind, and so things 
went on at the Flanagans’. The sisters were in a 
kind of bewilderment. Christina was going about, 
not speaking only when she couldn’t help it, and 
she feeling as if she was moving through a black 
fog, cold and dreadful, and Nelly upset, because 
she wasn’t used to anything from Christina but 


140 The Folk of Furry Farm 

petting. She’d wonder for a minute or so what 
at all should be the matter with Chrissy, and then 
she’d start her gay little lilt of a song again. . . . 

It appeared to Christina as if she had known all 
her life what was going to happen, when, a few 
days later, as she was coming in with the milk, 
what did she see, only Jim Cassidy, and he leaning 
over the half-door, just as she had often fancied 
him. Leaning across it he was, and Nelly stand- 
ing just inside, and they two laughing and chatter- 
ing together and seeming as if they didn’t think 
there was another soul in this living world, except 
their two selves. 

Christina started back; and the can of milk 
dropped out of her hold. 

“Oh, Chrissy! here’s Jim!” said Nelly, the 
words tumbling out over one another and she 
between laughing and crying . . . “and he only 
just after landing . . . .” 

“What else, only just landed?” said Jim, look- 
ing from one to the other, very puzzled; “what 
else would I do, only come on here straight?” 

“But sure, didn’t we see you . . . ? Ora, 
Chriss, look at the milk . . . !” 

“Never mind now! come and give a hand to 
wipe it up!” said Christina, and they all were glad 


A Daylight Ghost 141 

of an excuse for doing something, Christina in 
particular. For she was all of a tremble, and 
didn’t want that to be seen. 

So by this, one thing and another was spoken of, 
till at last Jim got telling them about a queer 
dream he had had, while he was on the way 
home. 

“I thought to see the two of you,” he said, “in 
the Big Meadow, and yous coming towards me, 
through the sunshine ... it appeared as if it 
was a Sunday, with yous, and so it was with us in 
the ship, too ... I remember it well. . . . ” 

“Sure, if you saw us, we saw you, too!” said 
Nelly; “Sunday . . . sure enough! it was the 
day old Mickey Heffernan was ...” 

She stopped herself, and grew very red. 

“The day Mickey Heffernan . . . what?” 
said Jim. 

“Ah, nothing at all!” said Nelly; “men does 
be shocking foolish betimes . . . and quare con- 
duction you got on with, that same day . . . 
backing away from us, as if you thought we had the 
scarleteen, or something you’d take from us, that 
you wouldn’t let us within the bawl of an ass of 
you. . .!” 

“That was quare and very quare, too!” said 


142 The Folk of Furry Farm 

Jim; “but I’ll see not to let the like occur again, 
if I can prevent it!” 

He and Nelly began to laugh again. And they 
two were so taken up with one another, that they 
never heeded Christina. She slipped away with- 
out their knowing. 

They didn’t miss her for long enough. Maybe it 
was bad of them; Jim that had trusted her, and 
Nelly that she had given up all for. But there’s 
what happened. And it was only natural, after all. 
Jim had Nelly; and Nelly couldn’t but be taken 
up with all he had to say. . . . And then, 
Christina was one that no one ever thought wanted 
looking after. So it wasn’t till it had grown dusk, 
that they began to wonder where she was, and 
why wasn’t she there, to be making down the fire, 
and seeing everything ready, as she always did. 
They waited a little bit longer, and then another 
little bit longer . . . and the time seemed short 
enough, to Jim, anyway; till at last they got 
uneasy, and went looking for Christina. 

But they never saw her again. 

They searched high and they searched low. 
They went to the neighbours, thinking to find her 
somewhere off among them; though, as they well 
knew, it was the last thing she thought of doing, 


A Daylight Ghost 143 

idling and ceilidhing 1 away from home of an 
evening. The neighbours came, and helped, and 
there wasn’t a spot about the place but they 
searched, calling and whistling and shouting for 
her; out all night with lanterns and candles. 
Every one had a great wish for Christina. Why 
wouldn’t they! she that was so good and kind. 
But she was not to be found. 

They kept up the search, for days and days, 
thinking it might be that some kind of weakness 
had come over the poor girl, and that they would 
come on her somewhere, and she in a faint. 

But not a sign of her ever they found. 

Some thought it was what she might have 
slipped into the lake, when she was turning out the 
cows after milking them, for it was down towards 
the water they were driven of an evening. And 
that lake, it was well known, had no bottom to it, 
in places; and it was supposed that the water 
drained away through underground channels . . . 
and if any one chanced to get drawn into one of 
them . . . well, there was no more to be known 
of that person. 

And more were -of the opinion that she might 
have fallen into one of the swallyin’-holes I 

1 Gossiping. 


144 The Folk of Furry Farm 

mentioned. And anything that goes in there 
never comes out any more. 

It nearly killed Nelly, the fright and awfulness 
of losing Christina that way. She fretted and 
pined, till the half of her wasn’t in it. And Jim 
as bad, for he was as fond of Christina as Nelly 
was; just in the same way, too; as if she was his 
sister. 

For many a long day, after Jim and Nelly were 
married, and living on there in the old home, they 
would talk of Christina, and think maybe she’d be 
coming back to them, just walk in on the door. . . . 
For they always thought it wasn’t dead she was 
at all, only “away” with the Good People in the 
old rath, at the top of the hill behind Greenan- 
more. 

The door was always left open, and the fire 
strong, and food ready, at night, and in particular 
on Hallow Eve, the way she could come in there, 
if she had a mind to. 

But she never did. 

And so best. It’s a poor thing, to be looking at 
happiness through another person’s eyes; even if 
you chance to be as fond of them as Christina was 
of Nelly, let alone of Jim. 


145 


A Daylight Ghost 

And it’s bad enough to fret for doing wrong. 
But isn’t it worse again to have to feel yourself 
sorry, and you after doing what you knew was 
right ! as it was with Christina. But there’s many 
a thing that it’s hard to explain, as well as what the 
Flanagans saw in the sunshine, that day crossing 
the Big Meadow. 


xo 


CHAPTER V 


MATCHMAKING IN ARDENOO 

There was of course a good deal of talk among the 
neighbours about all that took place at Greenan- 
more, just soon after old Flanagan dying there. 
To say nothing of the queer way Jim Cassidy 
appeared (as they said), to the two girls, that 
Sunday evening, when they were out in the hay- 
field, with old Heffeman . . . and anyway, no- 
thing was farther from Nelly’s thoughts then than 
the same Jim! whatever poor Christina may have 
had in her mind! ... To say nothing of this at 
all, wasn’t it a shocking affair to see a fine, good 
girl like Christina, going out of this world the way 
she did! no one to know what became of her, no 
more than if she never had been there at all ! 

Still, the people didn’t speak so much over it 
as you might expect. They felt Nelly and Jim 
wouldn’t like it. Besides, there was talk of Chris- 
tina’s being “away”; and as every one knows, it 
146 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 147 

doesn’t answer to be too free-spoken about the 
Good People. 

Very little of the talk reached Mickey Heffeman, 
as usual. He lived very backwards, as has been 
said; he heard little, and he said less. It was the 
fashion he had, and it served him well. It did now, 
for it helped him to believe that no one knew a 
word about his having wanted little Nelly Flana- 
gan for himself. In fact, very few did and they 
soon forgot it, there was so much else to be talked 
about. Mickey was very proud to think that the 
business with Nelly had gone no further; any man 
would feel the same. But instead of this taking 
the edge off him for getting married, it only made 
him the more anxious to hear of some other girl 
that would come in upon the floor of the Furry 
Farm. Julia was gone out of his way; so why 
would he not strive to bring a wife in there? 

Little Kitty Dempsey was the next he looked to 
get; and a very curious way that came about. Not 
that any man was to be blamed for fancying Kitty ! 
She had every one’s good word, the same little girl. 

“A very nice little cut of a person,” it would 
be said of her, “agreeable and pleasant-spoken in 
herself; noways uppish or short with any one. 
And the darlint blue eyes of her, that she can say 


148 The Folk of Furry Farm 

what she chooses with! Sometimes they’ll laugh, 
like running water in sunshine; and again, they’ll 
fill up, if she’s fretted, till they’d remind you of 
nothing so much as a shower of an April day. 
And as straight she is as a rush, and as light on her 
foot as a willy- wagtail ; like a young larch tree, 
slim and upright ; and wouldn’t any one sooner be 
looking at the like of that than at one that has been 
twisted and bent by the wind on the side of a hill, 
or has had the half of it ett away by a hungry colt? 
Oh, there’s some girls that there does be a power 
of marrying on, before they can be settled! But 
troth! that’s not so with Kitty Dempsey!” 

In fact, at this time, though Kitty was young 
yet, it was the wonder of Ardenoo that she wasn’t 
married long ago, for as they said, it wasn’t her 
looks stood in her way; though she never got to 
be as rosy in the face and flauhoolich 1 as her sisters 
all were. Many a time they blamed Kitty for that, 
as if she could help how she looked! But the 
father, old Dick Dempsey, would whisper to Kitty : 

“Never mind, asthore! it isn’t always the big 
people that reaps the harvest, Kitty!” 

He was very nice and gay, the poor man, and 
always had a great wish for Kitty, and stood up 

1 Burly. 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 149 

for her whenever he could. But Kitty was the 
youngest of a long family; and as you may often 
notice in that case, she seemed to come in for the 
fag-end of everything. 

When she was no more than a child, she could 
see plain enough that there wasn't a dance or a 
fair, a wake or a wedding far or near, but all the 
other girls would go off to, and have their fling of 
whatever fun was to be had. And they would say 
to Kitty, “Better for you stop at home and let 
your hair grow! you’ll have your turn by and by!” 

But there was not really much difference in age 
between Kitty and the next sister; only one had 
to stop at home, and somehow, Kitty was more 
agreeable to do that than any of the others. 
Though, as she grew up more, she often had a wish 
to go about, like another, and get her share of 
sport; and when they’d say, she’d have to wait 
another little while, and then let her take her turn, 
“To-morrow’s a long day ! ” Kitty would cry. But 
that never did her any good. 

She would feel it lonely enough, of an evening, 
when the others were away off sporting somewhere, 
and only the old father and mother left about the 
place. The only consolation Kitty had those 
times was when she’d go off to the well for the can 


150 The Folk of Furry Farm 

of water. Dan Grennan would be very apt to be 
there or somewhere about, and then, of course, 
he’d get the water for her to carry it home, as far 
as the back of the turf-clamp. Dan was a neigh- 
bour, a decent, quiet boy, what we call a “lone 
bird, ” for he had no one belonging to him in the 
place. 

Well and good; this got to be the habit most 
evenings, till Kitty’s mother took notice that the 
water began to be very late coming in for her cup 
of tea. So, out with her, one time, and she slipped 
along, very quiet and easy, till she heard a laugh 
from behind the turf-clamp. Round it she went; 
and there were Kitty and Dan, with the can of 
water on the ground between them. 

There’s where they were in error, not to have 
talked their fill below at the well, and have done 
with the thing. But sure, young people are all the 
same. When they begin to chatter and talk with 
one another, they get it as hard to stop as if it 
was the sea they were striving to empty out with a 
sieve. 

It chanced that old Mrs. Dempsey was very 
thirsty at that present time, which was what 
maybe had her so fractious. But indeed, at the 
best of times, the turn of a straw would leave her 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 151 

as cross as an armful of cats, she was so short in the 
temper. 

“Well, Dan, me fine fellah !” she said; “and 
is it you that is in it ? v ’ 

“It is, Mrs. Dempsey, mam,” answered Dan, 
quite civilly; and then he added, “and no harm 
in that, I hope?” 

He should not have said that; giving her an 
opening. 

“Troth, I dunno about that!” said she, and 
was twice as vexed, because poor Dan was so 
quiet-spoken with her; “that depends,” she says, 
“but a boy that has nothing between him and 
the world only his two hands has no call in 
life,” she says, “to be here, colloguing 1 with my 
dauther!” 

Mrs. Dempsey was a Cusack, and held herself 
very high. She turned to Kitty, that was as red 
as roses by then. 

“Off with ye, and bring in that water, that I’m 
sick and tired waiting on!” 

Kitty was ready enough to go. Ashamed she 
felt, to have that word said to Dan, and she by. 
She went off, without giving him word or look. 
How could she, with the mother stumping along 

1 Talking confidentially. 


152 The Folk of Furry Farm 


behind her, as big as a bush and as red as a turkey- 
cock! 

“And she gobbling out of her, too!” said Dan to 
himself, as he sneaked off, with a very sore heart. 
He was a fine, big, able boy, that you would never 
think troubled his head about anything. But boys 
like that have times that they want comforting, 
as well as another. Dan was out of a job then, 
and he was intended to ask an advice of Kitty, 
whether he ought to go to England for the harvest 
or not, only when he saw her, he forgot everything 
else except little Kitty Dempsey. He was not to be 
blamed for that. You would maybe have done the 
same yourself. 

But the very next day after Mrs. Dempsey giv- 
ing him his walking-papers, as I said, Dan got a 
job of driving a lot of cattle out to Dublin market. 
And when he had that done, he bobbed up against 
a comrade-boy of his own, and this boy was after 
taking his passage to America. And he was so 
lonesome in himself, to be going away, that he 
offered the lend of money to Dan, the way they 
could go together. I needn’t say Dan jumped at 
the chance. 

But he had to start off as he stood; and no one 
at Ardenoo knew a word about his going, for long 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 153 

enough. So there was many a mile of salt water 
between poor Dan and Kitty, and still Mrs. 
Dempsey would be going to the well herself of an 
evening. It was the price of her, to be putting 
such rounds upon herself, and for what? But as 
Dan said long after, when he and Kitty would be 
talking over things, “ Divil’s cure to them that has 
a bad suspicion of others!” 

Kitty used to fret a good deal, wondering how it 
was that she never saw Dan nor heard anything 
about him, since the time her mother caught her 
and him together behind the turf-clamp. But she 
passed no remarks to man nor mortal. And one 
day that she and the mother were at Melia’s shop, 
where the post-office is, a letter was slipped to 
Kitty, that no one saw only herself. Mrs. Melia 
knew well the sort old Mrs. Dempsey was, and so 
did every one else about Ardenoo. 

Kitty had to keep that letter in her pocket, and 
it burning a hole there, till she was going to bed 
that night before she had any opportunity of 
opening it. What was there inside of it, only a 
picture of Dan, all done out so grand and fine, 
that you would scarcely know it to be Dan at all, 
only his name was written under it. And on the 
back of the picture there was this verse: 


154 The Folk of Furry Farm 


When this you see, 

Then think of me, D. G. 

So Kitty was not much the wiser about what had 
happened, when she got this from Dan. But not 
long afterwards, she got word that it was in 
America he was, and had good pay there. And 
then no one seemed to know much more about 
Dan. 

It wasn’t too long after this, that old Dick 
Dempsey, himself, Kitty’s father, took and died on 
them; “harished out of the world,” some said, by 
the wife he had, that could never think anything 
right that he did ; or any one else, for that matter, 
except herself. There’s a power of people like 
Mrs. Dempsey. 

It was the woe day for poor Kitty, when her 
father was gone, and she and the mother left to 
manage for themselves. By this time all the 
others were married, or gone off to America. And 
of course they all said among themselves, that the 
farm that had reared the whole of them, and had 
given snug fortunes to every girl that married out 
of it, ought to be able to keep Kitty and the 
mother in the greatest of comfort. 

So it should too ; only there chanced to be a few 
bad seasons, when the grass was short ... or the 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 155 

rain didn’t come till it wasn’t wanted, and so the 
crops got spoilt in the saving. Every one else about 
Ardenoo was in the same boat. Except for this: 
Mrs. Dempsey was of the opinion that they were 
all fools but herself. That kept her down worse. 
She would take no advice. She thought she knew 
better than men that had been farming all their 
lives, while she had been rearing chickens and 
making butter. Her great idea was, to spend 
nothing. She grudged doing that, more than 
anything. 

Now it is well known that the best fertiliser you 
can use on land is, money. If you treat your land 
well, it will treat you well; a thing that is true of 
more than farming. 

But with Mrs. Dempsey it was take all and give 
nothing; above all, for labour. She would keep 
no help for the house. So it was Kitty! here; and 
Kitty! there, from dawn to dark. Kitty was 
never done. She was the most willing little 
creature you could find in a day’s walk; as good as 
ever was wet with water. But what avails all one 
girl can do on a farm? with poultry and milk, tur- 
keys and pigs, and then be expected as well to do 
haymaking, or the thinning of turnips, or dropping 
potatoes, and I don’t know what all besides. It 


156 The Folk of Furry Farm 


was only folly to think any one pair of hands could 
overtake all that. 

And here again was another reason why poor 
Kitty was not to have her chance of a bit of sport 
like another. At first, as I explained, she had to 
step one side, in order that the sisters that were 
older, the “ones that were next the door,” as they 
are called at Ardenoo, could have their fling, there 
were so many of them there. And secondly she 
had to stop at home now, because they were not 
there! no one in the place, only the old mother 
and Kitty. So that is how she never had any 
other “coort” except Dan; and of course then she 
thought all the more of him; the same as a hen 
with only one chicken. She’ll fuss and cluck as 
much for it as if she had the whole clutch. 

Girls that are allowed a bit of liberty, the way 
they can be putting a whole lot of boys through 
their hands, as some do, are better off in a way 
than Kitty was with Dan. 

“One thing moiders another!” as the man with 
the toothache said, when he felt the pain going 
into his ear. And if a girl has Phil, and Jack, Mike, 
and Pat as well as Art, it’s likely she’ll not fret too 
much about any of them if they go off, as Dan did. 

However, you never know what turn a young 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 157 

mind will take. People differ, as well as the things 
they happen up against. Kitty wasn’t like other 
girls; and those that knew her best never wished 
that she was. 

All the same, good and contented as she strove 
to be, it was hard on her! Year in, year out, going 
on the one old gait ; her nose for ever to the grind- 
stone. And along with all, if anything went wrong, 
Mrs. Dempsey would take and scold at Kitty, 
most bitterly, as if the girl was to be blamed when 
the potatoes turned black, or the oats got lodged, 
beaten into the ground with the heavy dreeps of 
rain. 

As for the fow ! That was what had the old 
woman more annoyed than anything. The rage 
she got into, one season, when a lot of young gos- 
lings died! She said it was what Kitty had neg- 
lected them, and that she cared for nothing, only 
idling her time over her geranium-pot. Now it 
was true that Kitty did think a lot of that flower, 
and no one but herself knew, or cared, that it was 
Dan Grennan that had brought it to her, and it 
only a little weeny bit of a thing. Kitty had 
minded it so well, that it flourished up the finest 
ever was seen. She was very fond of flowers, but 
any little bit of a garden that ever she made, some- 


158 The Folk of Furry Farm 

thing happened it; either the pigs rooted it, or the 
hens tore it about. So to keep her geranium-pot 
safe, it was up on top of the pump she had it, the 
time the goslings died. 

Mrs. Dempsey was making for it, to fling it pot 
and all out of that, when, behold ye! she was took 
bad all of a sudden. Some kind of Blessed Sick- 
ness it was ; and in the clap of your hand, it left her 
speechless, and with no power of herself from the 
waist down, ever after. In fact she didn’t last too 
long after this happening. But, of course, Kitty 
nor no one could know but she might live for years 
yet. 

When she was laid up that way, it left Kitty 
there, nothing but a bird alone, as you might say ; 
the mother good for nothing, only having to be fed 
and minded, the same as an infant child, and twice 
as hard to please as any baby. Kitty was that 
tender-hearted, that she fretted, night, noon, and 
morning, when the old woman wasn’t able to 
speak ; though what all the neighbours were saying 
was, “ Won’t poor Kitty have great ease, now that 
the mother’s tongue is stopped, the ould torment ! ” 

But to listen to Kitty, you would believe there 
never was another mother so good on the face of 
the earth, as what she had herself. 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 159 

Shortly after this taking place with the Demp- 
seys, the fair day of Timahoe came round. Dark 
Moll Reilly was in it, of course, herself and her 
fiddle. No wake nor wedding nor sport of any 
kind was right about Ardenoo, without Moll. 

There was people of the opinion that the dark 
woman could see more than she let on to be able to ; 
and that it was just a gait of going she put on, the 
way she could get a better acquaintance with 
things that were not meant for her. Certain it is 
that there wasn’t a stir, far or near, or anything 
going on about Ardenoo, but what Moll always 
had the first whimper of it. But no one ever heard 
a bad word from her, about any son of men; nor 
she wouldn’t either. She knew only too well, that 
she ought to be careful, and not have the people 
afraid of her tongue. In that way, she had many 
a snug stopping-place, where she was always made 
welcome, with her fiddle and her chat about every- 
thing, because the people felt Moll wasn’t one to 
carry stories. Besides, she was a knowledgeable 
person, and very understanding, and had made 
up many a match among the neighbours at 
Ardenoo. 

Going away from the fair she was, this day, 
when Big Cusack, that was a brother of Mrs. 


160 The Folk of Furry Farm 

Dempsey’s, overtook her on the road, and asked 
her would she sit up on the side-car with him, and 
he could be giving her a lift as far as he was going 
her way. 

“I’m thankful to ye, sir,” said Moll, “but I 
wouldn’t wish to be too troublesome. ...” 

“Not the least trouble in life!” he said, and 
gave her his hand across the well of the car, to help 
her up. And then, when they were jogging on 
again, they fell into chat and the whole topic 
between them was, poor Kitty Dempsey and the 
way she was left with the helpless old mother; 
and she with ne’er a one in it but herself. 

“But sure, she needn’t be so!” said Moll. 
“There’s plenty of boys would be glad enough to 
be sending in their papers there . . . and she your 
niece, too, Mr. Cusack!” 

“Troth, I’m not so sure about the boys at all!” 
said Big Cusack; “the most of them, they put a 
high figure on themselves now. They’re not to be 
caught with chaff, these times. Kitty Dempsey, 
indeed, with no stock to speak of on the farm! 
And it all racked out, the mother taking in grazing 
cattle, and letting them eat the roots out of the 
pasture . . . and the ditches choked . . . and 
fences wanting to be made up . . . let alone the 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 161 

two years' rent that’s owing on the place this 
minute. ...” 

He had a sup taken at that time, or he wouldn’t 
have been so talkative. 

“Do you tell me that! Dear, dear!” said Moll; 
though well she knew it all before he spoke. But 
there’s no way so good to flatter people up, as to 
listen to them talking as if it was all new to you, 
although you might have the thing twice as well 
off, as they would that were telling it. Dark Moll 
was well aware of this. Besides, being old and 
poor, as well as blind, the creature! of course she 
knew she ought to be very humble in herself. So 
she had the habit, as I said before, of being very 
careful and exact in what she would say, and in 
particular to a man like Big Cusack, a strong 
farmer that had a right to every respect. 

“I do tell you that, and, moreover, I’m sure of 
it!” says he in answer. 

“Troth, then, and I’m not one bit sure!” said 
Moll, “askin’ your pardon and grantin’ your grace 
for the word, Mr. Cusack! But I think, and not 
alone that, but it’s too sure I am that there’s 
plenty would jump at little Kitty Dempsey, ould 
mother and all. Sure, she can’t last for ever, God 
help her! and let her do her best. I know one, 


162 The Folk of Furry Farm 

anyway, that I’m too sure would take her, ” says 
Moll, “this instant minute; a qui’t, settled boy, wid 
money in the bank, as well as the snuggest place 
you need ask to lay an eye upon ! And he wanting 
a woman there, this len’th of time! And well you 
know that I’m only saying what’s the truth!” 

“Who is it you’re speaking of?” asks Cusack. 

“Why, who but Mickey Heffeman!” said Moll, 
“away off at the Furry Farm; he’s after marrying 
the sister Julia to a boy from Clough-na-Rinka 
. . . one of the Caffreys . . . but that’s no con- 
sam of a man like you, Mr. Cusack! But poor 
Mickey hasn’t one to do a hand’s turn for him now, 
barring himself. Sure he had a right to have 
looked into the thing before this, and not be leav- 
ing himself the way he is. And now he’s driving 
about the country, I hear, looking for a wife; and 
his spokesman with him. ...” 

“I have no great acquaintance with the man,” 
said Cusack. 

“No, nor couldn’t,” said Moll; “Mickey was 
like the rest of the Heffemans, great always at 
keeping himself to himself. And the lonesome 
place he has! But sure, if it was arranged, can’t 
he come to live at Dempsey’s, and be seeing after 
the two places from there, quite handy?” 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 163 

‘ ‘ That might answer, ’ ’ says Cusack. * 1 Middling 
ould he is, I believe?” 

“No more than sixty, if he’s that, itself,” said 
Moll; “and as sound as a trout; ay, and maybe 
would be better to Kitty than one of them young 
bloomin’ boys that’s going these times, the sorra 
much good they are only spreeing and play-acting. 
... But Mickey is not that way of thinking . . . 
real sober and . . . Let me down off o’ the car, 
Mr. Cusack, sir, if you please. . . . It’s to Biddy 
Fay’s I’m going for the night. ...” 

“We’re past it,” said Cusack. 

Moll knew that, as well as he did. But it came 
more natural to her to tell a lie than the truth, 
even if it was to do her no good itself. 

“Past the turn to Biddy’s are we? but sure 
we can’t be far,” said Moll; “just stop if you 
please, sir, and let me down and give me a twist 
round to set me going right, and may the Lord 
reward ye for helping the poor dark ould woman!” 

So Cusack did that; but it wasn’t to Biddy Fay’s 
Moll was steering; no, but passed on, and made 
for the Furry Farm, as hard as she could go. It 
was a long way, and she couldn’t make it that 
night at all. But the next evening she got to 
Mickey Heffeman’s right enough. 


164 The Folk of Furry Farm 


There was no one within at that time, except the 
boy that was spokesman to Mickey in looking for 
the wife. He was a neighbour’s son, well known to 
Moll. 

“ So you haven’t Mickey marrit yet? ” said Moll, 
when they had passed one another the time of day. 

“No, faith!” said the boy; “and sick and 
tired I am of the job ! God and the world wouldn’t 
plase Heffernan with a wife!” 

(l Och, wait till your own turn comes round, me 
hayro! maybe you’ll have picking and choosing 
then. ...” 

“When I want a wife, I’ll see to do the thing 
myself!” said the boy; “I’ll have no interference, 
only go and kill a Hussian for meself ! Why can’t 
a man go and make it all right with the girl her- 
self, and not to be having all this ould bothera- 
tion . . . ?” 

“ Musha!” says Moll, “there’s a great deal to be 
looked into, besides the girl!” 

So then she went on to talk of Kitty, and they 
spoke about that over and over and up and down ; 
and at long last the spokesman agreed to bring 
Heffernan across to Cusack’s the very next 
Sunday ; and he sent word by Moll. 

That all came about; and very pleasant they 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 165 

were, all round. Heffernan and a few more; tea 
they had and hot cake and punch afterwards. 

“I thought to have the girl herself here,” said 
Cusack, “but she’s not willing to leave the mother, 
that’s ‘donny’ this len’th of time; and besides 
she’s a bit timersome in herself. ...” 

“ She’s none the worse of that ! ” says the spokes- 
man ; “ and anyway, won’t it be time enough, when 
we have all settled . . . we’ll see her then. . . 

To make a long story short, they agreed about 
the whole thing, that very evening; Cusack 
praising up the Dempseys’ farm, sure, and all the 
fine grass it was able to grow; and the spokesman 
not one bit behind in making much of the Furry 
Farm. Mickey himself said nothing, only sat 
there smoking and looking into the fire. 

And there’s the sort they were laying out for 
little Kitty Dempsey! and he without a word to 
throw to a dog ! But they never minded him ; only 
settled everything, even to having the wedding in 
a week from then. Heffernan and the boy went off 
home, and Cusack went to his bed, very satisfied 
with the work he was after putting over him. 

Away with him the very next day to Dempsey’s 
to tell Kitty. He found her very lonesome and 
fretted. 


1 66 The Folk of Furry Farm 

“I miss me poor mother, every hand’s turn,” 
she said; “now that she’s laid by in her bed. 
And I dunno at all how I’ll get to mind her, the 
way she should be attended to. Och, but it’s lone- 
some the place is, without her voice, even to be 
faulting me! And the doctor’s bottles to be paid 
for . . . !” 

So the uncle begins then to advise Kitty about 
this thing and that, and how it was a thing im- 
possible for her to be thinking of going on the way 
she was; she could never manage to do all. And 
then he worked it round that she ought to get 
married. And in the end he spoke of the fine 
match he was after making up for her. 

“ What ! It’s not ould Mickey Heffernan ! ” said 
Kitty. “I never seen the man, but I remember 
to hear me father, the heavens be his bed ! speak of 
him as a settled man, since I was the height of a 
bee’s knee! An old fellah ...” and then Kitty 
took to go cry the father, that had always been 
so good to her. 

“Hut, what at all!” said Cusack; and then he 
began to reason cases with Kitty over the mar- 
riage, reminding her that the mother was depend- 
ing out of her then ; and what a good thing it would 
be for them both, for Kitty to get Heffernan that 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 167 

was able and willing to pay up the rent that was 
due on the Dempseys’ farm; and how would Kitty 
like for them to be thrown out on the roadside, 
instead of being left in the old home in comfort, and 
having some one sensible to do all for them? 

Poor little Kitty! she cried down tears like the 
rain. For that was the first that ever she heard of 
there being rent owing. It was the mother that 
had managed badly to let that happen ; she 
couldn’t help it, maybe; and had never told Kitty 
a word about it. 

Kitty said now, would the uncle wait a bit, till 
she could think it over? But Cusack saw no sense 
in that; he being an experiented man in business 
and money and all to that. He knew there might 
only be unpleasantness, if there was any delay. 
And maybe Heffernan might change his mind 
about paying up, and then wouldn’t he only have 
had his trouble for nothing, and Kitty not settled, 
and where would the rent come from? Cusack 
hadn’t it, nor wouldn’t know where to look for it. 

So he just told Kitty that the gale-day was 
coming round very shortly, and what was she going 
to do, to make up the rent? And that cowed her, 
the crature! and she was always biddable. Sure 
she got the fashion of it, from the time she was able 


168 The Folk of Furry Farm 

to walk. So she gave in to what Big Cusack 
said. 

In due course, the day for the wedding came 
round. There was a great gathering of the neigh- 
bours and friends at Dempsey’s, and everything 
done in the greatest of style, four bridesmaids for 
Kitty no less. Cusack wanted to do the thing 
right, when he went about it, and he took on the 
ordering of it all. 

Up bowls Heffernan’s side-car, and himself and 
his friends ; and he with a sprig of spearmint in his 
coat for a buttonhole-bit ; feeling as fresh in him- 
self as a rolled ass. But he was as white as the 
snow about the head, and as lame as a duck, the 
poor man! And when they saw him, spraddling 
up towards the house, “Sure, that can’t be him 
that’s going to be marrit!” said one of the brides- 
maids. Not one of them ever laid eyes on Mickey 
before. He was never one for going about, as I 
said, and in particular had given up the fashion of 
even going to a wake, or any place of the kind, 
where the boys and girls consort together, for 
years past. 

“ Is it a wife he wants, or a coffin?” says another 
girl; “bad scran to him, what a thing he wants 
to go do, to get a girl to marry him!” 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 169 

I needn’t say, Kitty wasn’t let hear these re- 
marks. But of her own accord, when Heffernan 
got up to the door, she makes one fly, out of the 
kitchen, and into her own little room, and begins 
to cry. And the bridesmaids went after her, and 
clapped the door to, and began flinging up their 
hands, and crying “Och, wirra, wirra!” till you’d 
think it was keening at a funeral they were, and 
not at a wedding, where there should be nothing 
but rejoicement. 

The noise they made vexed Cusack. 

“ What nonsense is this?” he said; “let me have 
no more of it! Go after Kitty, ” he said, “and tell 
her I order her to come out here, at once ! and not 
to be making a Paddy FitzSummons’s grand- 
mother of herself. Let alone of every one else!” 
he says. 

“Och, give her her time!” said Heffernan. It 
was remembered to him after, that the only word 
he said at that time was to try to pass things off 
agreeably. 

A comrade-girl of Kitty’s, that knew the ins and 
outs of the whole affair, went up into the room 
after her. 

“Come back into the kitchen, Kitty agra!” she 
said; “and give over that work. . . . Put by that 


170 The Folk of Furry Farm 

pickther of poor Dan . . . that’s all done with 
. . . and where’s the sense in heating up old 
broth . . . ?” 

But Kitty did nothing, only stand there with her 
face to the wall in a corner, and she crying; while 
outside in the kitchen, Cusack was raging like a lion. 

“She should be made to come out here!” he 
said; “I seen girls before now purshood through a 
bog, and had to be tied on the car, to get them to 
the chapel, the way they could be married. . . . 
Well, Moll Reilly, and is that yourself?” 

“It is, it is, then! and God save all here!” said 
Dark Moll, very breathless and hurried. “ Where’s 
Kitty? Not that I could see her! but sure I 
thought she would be coming to bid me the ceud 
mile failte! ” 1 

Cusack began to whisper to Moll, to explain 
what was going on. But she seemed not to care to 
hear him, and only anxious to get into where 
Kitty was. 

“Let me at her; I’ll go talk to her!” said Moll, 
“and you’ll see I’ll soon make her l’ave that, 
before I have done with her!” 

And so she did, too. But it wasn’t exactly the 
way Cusack thought. 

1 Hundred thousand welcomes. 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 171 

“Take care! Mind yourself!” said he to Moll, 
seeing her making a drive for the door of Kitty’s 
room, the same as if she had the sight of her eyes. 
But Moll was so taken up with what she had on 
her mind, that for once she forgot she was blind. 

“You’re wanting without there!” said Moll to 
the bridesmaids; and when they were gone, said 
she, very quiet and easy, “Who do you think I’m 
after seeing ... I mean, after meeting up with 
. . . there, a while ago?” 

“I dunno, ” said Kitty, giving a great sob. 

“. . . and he looking into the well . . . and 
talking of how he used to be rising cans of water 
there with you . . . and then carrying them as 
far as the turf-clamp. ...” 

“Not Dan!” said Kitty. And she turned first 
as white as paper and then as red as roses. 

“Faith, who else?” said Moll. 

“Ora, what made he come now? and it too late ! ” 

And Kitty began to cry again. 

“Late? the sorra late!” said Moll. 

“Why wouldn’t it be late, and the wedding all 
fixed up? ... let alone the rent that’s owing. 
. . .” Kitty was thinking that Dan had come 
home as poor as he went. 

“Och sure! ‘divil dance on the rint!’ — there’s 


172 The Folk of Furry Farm 

the very word Dan said!” said Moll; “it’s chums 
and ass-loads of money he has with him, that he’s 
after bringing out of America!” 

That was only foolish talk of Moll’s. A few 
pounds was all Dan had been able to gather up 
while he was away. But it was enough, for all 
that. To start with, he had given Moll a half- 
sovereign out of his purse, to let him have a word 
with Kitty. Ay, and had promised her as much 
more, if he got her. And Moll had never owned 
that much before in her life. Whereas, all old 
Heffeman would be good for would be an odd 
copper or two, and maybe an apronful of potatoes, 
whatever time they would be going to waste. 

“Poor Dan, and he only landed home yester- 
day!” said Moll; “and the fine figure of a man 
that he is!” 

“Ora, what will I do, at all at all?” cried Kitty, 
with the tears pouring down her face. They two 
were shut into Kitty’s room, while outside the 
kitchen was full up of people, fidgeting about, 
waiting for the bride to appear and passing the 
time by looking at every mortal thing in the place. 

The table was all laid out for the wedding 
dinner, the greatest you could see. And when any 
of the Dempseys’ friends would pass remarks, 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 173 

carelesslike, on the fine white table-cloth, or the 
china teacups, or the silver forks and spoons ; they 
well knowing that all had been borrowed from 
Miss O’ Farrell above at the Big House ... on the 
minute, Heffeman’s spokesman would cry out: 
“We’ve bigger and betther at home, in our 
place!” 

But in Kitty’s room: “What will you do, is it?” 
Moll was saying: “well, seeing the strong faction 
that Heffeman has with him, there would be 
neither sense nor reason in Dan Grennan’s coming 
in for you among them all, and he without one, 
only himself ; barring that he could r’ise a ruction, 
like Phaudrig Crohoore ! But he never could ; and 
as he can’t come to you, you’ll have to go to him. ” 

“How so?” says Kitty; “they’re the full up of 
the kitchen, so that I couldn’t pass them by; and 
as for the window, it’s that small I needn’t try that 
way; so what am I to do, Moll?” 

“Troth, it’s you has little wit! What’s to ail 
you, only to put on my cloak, and the hankercher 
over your head, and draw it well down over your 
eyes . . . and who’s to know is it Dark Moll or 
Kitty Dempsey? ... I mean, Mrs. Dan Grennan, 
that is to be . . . !” 

“And then . . . what am I to do, after?” said 


174 The Folk of Furry Farm 

Kitty, with a trembling in her voice. But there 
was a kind of little smile in her eyes, too. 

Moll explained the thing. 

“You’ll meet Dan below, there at the well. 
Sure it’s you that mightn’t be surprised to see him 
there, nor he to see you, faith! And Heffernan’s 
car is at the comer below, just out of sight of this 
house.” 

“But ... but . . .” 

“And why not? Isn’t that car nearly yours, 
this minute, and haven’t you every right, so, to 
take the lend of it? And maybe you never would 
have the chance again! Lepp up on it, yourself 
and Dan! and off wid yiz to the chapel. Ould 
Father Brogan is laid up in his bed, God assist him 
from it, I pray! and it’s the new curate, that 
doesn’t know Jack from Paddy in this parish, that 
had to be sent by Father Brogan this morning, to 
marry you and . . . who will I say, eh, Kitty? Is 
it ould Heffeman with his critch and his white 
beard you’ll take, or Dan? You have your choice. 
And there’s another thing! I gave word to a 
brides-boy and girl to be waiting below there on 
the road, and go with you, to give an appearance 
to it all, and the way you’d not feel lonesome . . . 
and . . .” 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 175 

“Are ye coming, Kitty?” said Cusack, with a 
roar like a bull, he was so impatient. 

“What’ll I do at all at all?” says Kitty to Moll, 
most pitiful. 

Moll opened the door a little bit. 

“She’ll be wid yous, in one instant minute of 
time,” she said to Cusack in a whisper; “wait 
until I go to the well for a sup of water, to beethe 
her timples. . . . It’s no way for a girl to be 
getting marrit, ” says Moll, “to have a pair of red 
eyes, and a swelled nose upon her; and well you 
know that, Mr. Cusack!” 

“There’s water here in the kitchen,” said 
Cusack. So there was, plenty. 

“That’ll not do, it must be drawn fresh,” said 
Moll. 

“I’ll send a boy for it; here, Patsy! you’ll be 
soupler than Moll!” 

“Ora, will you be aisy ! that would not answer at 
all!” said Moll. “I must go for it wid meself and 
no one else by; there’s a char-rum to be said over 
the well . . . and let no one speak a word to 
Kitty while I’m doing all that!” 

“Well, well, whatever you say!” said Cusack. 
He knew Moll to be an experiented woman and so 
she had her way. 


176 The Folk of Furry Farm 

Moll then as soon as she had the door shut again 
on Cusack and all the people, was taking off the 
cloak and handkerchief and giving all instructions 
over again to Kitty, when, “ Look-at-here ! ” said 
Cusack ; ‘ * more misfortunes ! ’ ’ 

And over he rushed to the hearth, like a red- 
shank, to where the dinner was being cooked. A 
great, sudden cloud of steam was rising up, and 
threatening to destroy everything. The pig's face 
and greens was after boiling over into the fire, and 
all the women gathered round, puffing and blowing, 
striving to keep down the ashes that was powder- 
ing over the fine elegant goose they had roasting 
in front of the fire. The men just stood round, 
their hands in their pockets and their mouths 
gaping open, not able to do a hand’s turn, only all 
very much engaged wondering what would be- 
come of the dinner. . . . 

As Moll said after, ’twas God that done it, that 
started the thing, so that she perceived ’twas little 
they would be thinking of Kitty. “Here now, 
here’s your chance, and take it, girl dear! Throw 
the cloak about ye, and dart while you’re young!” 

On the word, there stepped out into the kitchen 
(to all appearance) Dark Moll, with her head 
down, and off she went at a dog’s trot to the well. 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 177 

And not one even took notice that she never asked 
to bring a can, or even a noggin with her, to get the 
water in. In fact, not one of the wedding-party 
thought of meddling with Moll (as they thought), 
they were so taken up with the danger the goose 
was running with the ashes. 

But when all that was done with, they waited, 
and they waited; at long last, first one and then 
another slipped out to try could they see what was 
delaying Moll at the well. 

“Where must she be, the ould rap?” said 
Cusack, very short. 

“Here’s her cloak, anyway!” said a girl, picking 
it up where Kitty had let it fall. . . . 

“Sure, that’s not Moll’s cloak, girl dear!” said 
another, giving her a look to say no more. 

There was a good deal of the people beginning to 
have a suspicion that something was up. 

“Your car is gone, Mr. Heffeman, ” said one, 
and then the spokesman said, “So it is! beyant 
there it was heeled up. ...” 

“Where’s Kitty? where’s Kitty?” shouts Cu- 
sack, dashing back to the house, and on into her 
room. 

Of course, it was empty. Moll had watched her 
opportunity and had slipped out of the house with 


12 


178 The Folk of Furry Farm 

the crowd, and whatever any one else might have 
thought, Cusack took no notice, till he ran out 
again, and met up with her near the well. It 
wasn’t till then that he began to suspect some 
villainy. 

“Where’s me niece? where’s Kitty, I ask ye? 
This is some of your tricks, ye ould faggot, ye!” 
says Cusack, very fierce. 

“Och, the Lord save us!” says Moll, pretending 
to cry; “and that he may forgive you, Mr. Cusack, 
for having the bad thought of a poor dark woman ! 
Is it me to go do the like ! Sure yous all seen me, 
and I going off for the water . . . and it’s what I 
must have took a wakeness and I coming back 
. . . fell out of me standing, so I did; sure, isn’t 
there me cloak upon the ground, where I had to 
let it down off o’ me shoulders. ...” 

What could Cusack say to that? And, indeed, 
no more questions were asked then. For the 
weight of the people could make a guess about 
what was going on. And when the spokesman 
called out, that they should pursue after them, for 
who could tell what might be happening to Heffer- 
nan’s side-car, and a lot of other boys, ready for a 
bit of fun, began yoking up, there was n’t a bridle 
to be found! Stuck into the heart of the turf- 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 179 


clamp they were; got there that night late. But 
no one ever knew who put them there. 

There was nothing more to be done, then, except 
to gather back into the house, and wait. And by 
degrees, it appeared as if some that were there 
knew more than they cared to tell. Whether they 
did not, it vexed Heffernan’s party, who began to 
look inclined for fight. Only for Dark Moll, in- 
deed, there might have been a bit of a row, but 
she kept going about from one to another, talking, 
and saying how that there was no use in crying 
over spilt milk, and if Kitty itself was gone, wasn’t 
there as good fish in the sea as ever came out of it? 
So they all did their best to make the thing pass 
over quietly. The dinner was nearly ready, and 
wouldn’t it be a pity, they all thought, to have it 
wasted! And Heffernan’s spokesman, when Big 
Cusack said they might as well wait and take their 
share of whatever was going, agreed, and added: 

“ We might as well ! Sure won’t we have to stay, 
anyway, till they’re back with the car! Mickey 
would be hard-set to go any distance with that leg 
of his!” 

The boy was young, and had no intention of 
losing his chance of whatever sport there might be, 
no matter who got Kitty. 


180 The Folk of Furry Farm 

Heffernan as usual said nothing. He was look- 
ing very down in the mouth. But who could 
wonder at that, after the way things had gone 
against him? 

Before any more was said, back rolled the car, 
and Mickey and the spokesman had to make the 
best they could of seeing it, with Dan and Kitty 
sitting upon it! It was fortunate that the new 
curate that had just married them came with them, 
for of course every one would be anxious to have no 
unpleasantness before him. But, besides, there 
was a girl with them, Margaret Molally by name, 
that they had expected to the wedding, but had 
been delayed; so that when the car overtook her, 
as she was hurrying along to Dempsey’s, she was 
glad enough to take the lift they offered her. And 
Dan got her up beside him, he driving, while Kitty 
and the curate sat together; and so Dan had 
an opportunity of explaining the thing to Marg 
Molally. 

Between her and the young priest, everything 
went off quite smoothly. He suspected nothing, 
and so it was all the easier to keep up appearances 
before him. As for Marg, she just went about 
from one to another, now attending to the old 
bedridden mother, and now helping with the 


Matchmaking in Ardenoo 181 

cooking, or passing a pleasant remark to some of 
the strangers that were there. Heffernan himself 
showed up well. No one could have acted better 
than he did that day. He showed no spleen, but 
when they all had their dinners taken, and a glass 
or two was given round, to set the thing going, 
Mickey was the first to take the floor with the 
bride, game leg and all; while Dark Moll played 
up her best with “Haste to the Wedding!” and 
“The Joys of Matrimony.” 


CHAPTER VI 


A SETTLED GIRL 

It’s often remarked, that one wedding brings on 
another; as if, you’d really think, the men were 
like sheep, and if one ventures, the rest of the flock 
will follow the same way, even if it’s over a cliff or 
down the face of a quarry-hole. And that is how 
the neighbours accounted to themselves for what 
occurred at the Furry Farm, not long after the 
affair at Dempsey’s that is after being related. 
You’d think poor Mickey had had enough bad luck 
to daunt a younger man than he was. Two fine 
young girls he had been after, and still, there he 
was, without a woman at home to look after the 
place for him. But in spite of all, he appeared to 
feel an interest in anything of the sort that would 
be going on, as if he thought by that means to get 
some insight into how the thing should be managed. 
Still he couldn’t but feel that he had had enough of 
looking for young, foolish persons, and that it 
would be fitter for him to be thinking of one more 
182 


A Settled Girl 


183 


his own standing in life. He may have thought 
this out for himself, or it may have been pure 
Chance that brought him and Marg Molally to- 
gether; if there is such a thing as Chance! Any- 
way Dark Moll had a hand in it too, as usual with 
such affairs about Ardenoo. It certainly was 
Moll’s doing that Marg was at the wedding at 
Dempsey’s, and that began the whole business, 
though Mickey never cast a thought on Marg that 
day scarcely, nor she on him, except to be kind to 
him; and that she was to every one there; she 
couldn’t be different. 

As for Moll, the design she had in persuading 
Marg to go to the wedding had nothing at all to do 
with Mickey or the Furry Farm. 

At that time, there was not a more lonesome 
creature in all Ardenoo than Margaret Molally! 
She had not long before buried her father; and 
that left her without one but herself, in the little 
place they had, a bit up the boreen that borders 
Dempsey’s farm. So she was sitting inside by the 
fire, one fine morning, because she had no heart to 
do anything else, when she heard some one coming 
along towards the house; and by the knock-knock 
of a stick upon the path she guessed it to be Dark 
Moll. And so it was. 


184 The Folk of Furry Farm 


“God save all here!” said Moll, groping her way 
forward, till she felt the half-door, and could lean 
in over it. Blind and all as she was, it was seldom 
Moll missed her mark. 

“God save yourself, kindly, Moll,” said Marg, 
getting up to bring the blind woman in; “but, 
sure, there’s no one here now with me, only meself ; 
and not long I’m to be left here, either, by all I 
hear!” 

Her tears began to flow down again as she said 
this. 

“I got a slight knowledge of that,” said Moll, 
when she got herself settled on the stool by the fire, 
that Marg led her to; “just a whimper of it that is 
going about through the people. But it’s hard-set 
a poor blind body does be, to get at the rights of 
a story. Ay, acushla ! it’s easy to deceive Dark 
Moll! But what I understand is,” she went on, 
“that you’ll have to quit out of this; and, more- 
over, they are all on the same word about it, that 
it’s bad treatment for your poor father’s child! 
Ay, indeed!” 

“Sure, who ever heard of a girl being a herd 
over a farm!” said Margaret. 

That was the means of living the Molallys had 
had. The father was herd on a small holding of 


A Settled Girl 


185 


land. He was a weakly, delicate man, that was 
seldom able for a whole day’s work, though willing 
always to do his best. But he was a nice, respecta- 
ble person, that could be depended on, and he had 
the good word of all that knew him. 

“A girl made herd?” said Moll; “well, I dunno! 
and still they all tell me that it was yourself did 
the weight of the work here, instead of the poor 
father, those years past!” 

“There was no one else,” said Margaret. 

“Wasn’t there Larry, your brother?” said Moll; 
“and he had a right to have stopped at home here, 
to help them that reared him, and only the two of 
you in it; instead of galloping off to America, the 
way he did, and leaving all to you to do. ...” 

“That’s all gone by now,” said Marg. She 
didn’t want to hear Larry blamed; though it was 
his fault that she was left now poor and alone. 

The name Larry Molally had in Ardenoo was, 
that he was “a bad bird, as ever flew! an arch- 
thief, mixing himself up in every mischief about 
the place, ever since he could mitch from school. ” 

In spite of that, and a great deal more that the 
neighbours never knew, the mother doted on 
Larry. It’s often the case, and the worse a child 
behaves, the more anxious the. mother is to make 


1 86 The Folk of Furry Farm 

excuses for him ; as if he was blind or deaf, or even 
had not right sense. God knows, maybe that is so, 
and they go wrong because they have not the wit 
to know the difference! 

“Your poor mother that fretted for Larry !” 
said Moll, with a change of tune as she noticed how 
Marg spoke of the matter. 

“She did so!” said Marg; “she got little and 
humpy, and poor-looking in herself, no matter 
what you’d try to do for her! She never would 
stir out of that chimney-corner, only spinning and 
knitting stockings to have ready for Larry, against 
he’d come home to her! God help her! and there 
they are yet, hanging by a cord across the chimney, 
the very way she had them, when she was took 
bad. ...” 

“Ay! died off in the clap of your hand, so she 
did!” said Moll. “Well I remember it! The light 
of Heaven be with her soul, and the soul of your 
father, this day, I pray; and what was it ailed him, 
acushla?” 

“A cold he took,” said Marg; “a cold that went 
in on him, and turned to a suggestion on the lungs. 
It was there, the doctor said, the whole demur was; 
and he lasted very short, only the week, and went 
off in the night-time, quiet and easy. ” 


A Settled Girl 


187 


“I’m proud to hear that,” said Moll; “and, 
moreover, so best, not to see him suffer long; 
for when a disease like that gets its hold on you, 
all the doctors from this to Jarminy won’t be of 
the least assistance! But sure, we all have to go, 
when our time comes round; and welcome be the 
will of God!” 

“It leaves me terrible lonesome here this day!” 
said Margaret, wiping her eyes on her apron. 

“Ay are ye lonesome,” said Moll, “and lone- 
some again, to the back of that! But God Al- 
mighty gives some people very quare treatment. 
. . . That’s a darling fine lot of little goslings you 
have there ... as well as a poor body like me can 
see ... I mean, can tell by the yeep! yeep! of 
them. They’ll be worth good money to you, one 
of these days! How many have you in the flock? ” 

“ Six-and-twenty, ” said Margaret, “but sure, I 
have no heart for them or anything, now! and 
don’t know where I can get a roof over my own 
head, let alone the hens and geese, and the poor 
cow, that’s after having twin calves, the finest that 
you could lay eyes upon!” 

“Twin calves!” said Moll; “that always is for 
luck!” 

“Och, for luck!” said Margaret. “There’s no 


188 The Folk of Furry Farm 

such thing for me as luck. I often wish I was done 
with everything. ...” 

‘‘Ora, what kind of talk is that to be having!” 
said Moll; “you’re just down a bit in yourself, 
girl dear! But you won’t be so! To-morrow’s a 
new day. And did you hear the great fine wedding 
they’re to have above at Dempsey’s ; for Kitty and 
old Mickey Heffernan?” 

“I heard nothing about it, only that it was to 
be, ” said Marg, “and could scarce believe it. But 
sure, let every one please themselves ! But as for 
the wedding, I don’t know a ha’porth about it!” 

“No, nor couldn’t,” said Moll, “living the way 
you do, up this lonesome place! But you’ll be 
there of course?” 

“I’ll wait till I’m asked!” said Marg. 

“And isn’t that what brought me here,” said 
Moll quickly, so quickly that Marg never sus- 
pected it was a lie of Moll’s. She was so well used 
to saying whatever would serve her turn that any 
one might be deceived into believing her. But 
what Moll said to herself, by way of excuse, was 
that she knew well Marg would be welcome, for 
Kitty Dempsey had a heart as big as a box and 
would welcome any old friend, such as Marg 
Molally, with a ceud mile failte! 


A Settled Girl 


189 


“Of course you’re asked,” Moll went on, “and 
expected, too; and why would you not go? Hold 
up your head! there’s money bid for ye!” 

“I’m done with all that sort of talk now,” said 
Marg; “that may be left to the young girls. . . . ” 

“I dunno about that!” said Moll; “it mightn’t 
be too late at all for you. God’s good. And you 
never can tell what floor you’ll meet your luck 
on!” 

“ I have no great wish for going, ” said Margaret, 
then. 

“Well, please yourself, and your friends will like 
you the better!” said Moll; “only it’s too sure 
I am that your father’s child would be welcome at 
that wedding ! The Dempseys had always a great 
wish for the Molallys; and along with that, I was 
thinking in meself, that if you were there, you 
would be giving a hand with the poor old mother. 
She’s more helpless this minute than an infant 
child ; God look down on all them that has no use 
of their legs!” 

“That’s another thing altogether,” said Marg; 
“maybe I would take a streel up there. . . . Mrs. 
Dempsey often was kind to us. . . . ” 

“Her tongue that was the worst of her ...” 
said Moll, “but maybe she couldn’t help it.” 


190 The Folk of Furry Farm 

“ Her bark was worse than her bite, ” said Marg; 
“and now, Moll, sit over to the table, and take 
share of the bit of dinner. . . 

And when that was over, Moll went off to the 
Dempseys’, and made it all right with Kitty about 
Margaret Molally being asked to the wedding. 

The reason Moll wanted that done was, to bring 
round a plan she was trying to work out. It was 
for her own good, but she oughtn’t to be too much 
blamed for that ! Any one like Moll has to think 
for themselves. She was just depending out of God 
and the neighbours ; along with any little trifle she 
could make out by the old fiddle, playing at fairs, 
or wakes or weddings, as the case might be. But 
it wasn’t much she ever got in that way, and she 
never expected more than a few coppers. People 
can’t give what they have not got. There were 
other helps that Moll looked to; such as stopping 
at Molally’s for a night or so, and getting a meal 
there, when she would be in that direction. The 
Molallys were good to her; and so she didn’t 
like the notion of Marg’s leaving that house, and 
maybe whoever would come after her might not 
be so agreeable. 

This is why Moll was making up a match in her 
own mind, for Margaret, with a boy that was a 


A Settled Girl 


191 

second cousin’s son of her own, and that was very- 
well acquainted with Mickey Heffernan, being in 
fact his spokesman at that time, and having made 
up the match for him with Kitty Dempsey. Moll 
knew that this boy, Jack Rorke by name, would be 
at the wedding, of course ; and her idea was to get 
him and Marg acquainted. Then there might 
be another wedding, between them; Jack Rorke 
might slip in for the herding that old Molally used 
to have, and Marg could remain on in her home. 
But above all, in that case, Moll would still be able 
to stop there when it suited her, and get the best of 
treatment, as she always had, from the Molally s. 

Moll was right about the Dempseys. 

“It’s proud we’ll be to see any old friends here 
that day, such as one of the Molallys, ” said Big 
Cusack, who was managing the whole thing for 
Kitty. 

“ I was sure of that, ” said Moll, “and I’m ready 
and willing to call over and bring poor Marg any 
message you send. ...” 

Cusack was sitting outside the door, smoking a 
pipe, and he went on to say, “What I often do be 
thinking is, why isn’t that fine decent girl married 
herself?” 

“Musha, then you couldn’t tell, nor no one 


192 The Folk of Furry Farm 


could !” said Moll; “nor yet how a thing of the 
kind might come about still !” 

“Good and hard-working she is,” said Cusack, 
“and comes of a decent stock. And I understand 
she has a snug little fortune, that the poor father 
laid by for her, too. I don’t know, in this world 
wide, what the boys can be thinking about, that 
she’s not married long ago! They have no 
sense, or one of them would have had her before 
this!” 

“Well, it’s often I heard it said, ” answered Moll, 
“that every dog has his day; and that every 
woman gets her chance; and so it will be with 
Marg!” 

She was thinking of the young cousin she had in 
her mind, to marry Marg. Little she or any one 
else except herself and the one boy knew that 
Margaret Molally had had her chance, years ago, 
and had let it pass her by! Marg was like other 
girls in that. But the difference was in herself. 

People talk about girls and courting as if they 
were all made after the one pattern, and what one 
does is the same as all the rest. But girls are as 
different in their natures as in their looks. Some 
are all for fun with any boy they meet ; and others 
are as shy and as silent and stiff as a young filly off 


A Settled Girl 


193 

the side of a mountain ; and there are good and bad 
of both sorts. 

Margaret was one of the quiet ones; timid and 
proud and humble always, though she needn’t have 
been, she was so fine and handsome. She would 
take the eye, anywhere, so that you would think 
she might pick and choose among the boys of 
Ardenoo. So whatever made her take a fancy to 
Patsy Ratigan, it would be hard to explain. For 
he was what is known as a “bit of a play-boy”; 
always up to some sport; as different from Marg 
as dark is from day. But she thought that the sun 
shone out of Patsy; and they would have made a 
match of it, sure enough, only for Marg’s brother 
going off to America, the way he did. 

That was what upset all Margaret’s plans. In 
the first place, she saw very plainly that it would 
never do for her to be thinking of her own concerns, 
or to dream of leaving the old people. The father 
was failing in health, and the poor mother could 
do nothing but fret after Larry. That wasn’t all. 
When Larry went, he had taken Marg’s fortune 
with him ; took it down from where it was hidden, 
up in the thatch, to pay his passage to America! 
the money that was saved for Margaret, and that 
she herself had helped to put together! 


13 


194 The Folk of Furry Farm 

A mean, bad trick it was of Larry’s, so much so 
that the Molallys could not say a word about it, 
for shame’s sake, to think that their son should rob 
his own sister. At least, that is how Margaret and 
the father felt. But the poor mother took his part 
even then, and said, why wouldn’t he take it! 
Hadn’t a son as good a right as a daughter to 
anything about the place? and better, too! And 
then she cried and said, she never thought Marg 
would grudge his share to poor Larry ! and he her 
only brother, and no harm in him, only a bit of 
foolishness. 

Marg said no more. But she knew well that once 
the money was gone, it was gone for good and all ; 
they need never hope to get so far before the world 
again. And she would never marry into the 
Ratigans unless she could bring money with her, 
to have them passing remarks about her and her 
people. 

Most of the money that Larry took away with 
him had been put together by Mrs. Molally and 
Margaret. Whatever they made by their eggs and 
butter and so on they saved for Marg’s fortune, 
and added it to anything the father could lay by 
for the same purpose, after the rent and other 
debts were paid. That was little enough! But 


A Settled Girl 


i95 


the two women would always be having something 
to sell. Mrs. Molally, in particular, was noted for 
that. It was sometimes said that all she wanted 
was to get Marg married and “from under her feet 
in the house, the way she could have the place to 
herself and be looking after the father and Larry, 
without any one else to interfere between them.” 
That might be; she might have felt jealous of the 
way the father had, of looking to Margaret for his 
pipe of an evening, or the clean collar for Mass on 
Sunday. And many a mother has to let her girl 
get the upper hand of her at her own fireside. But 
Mrs. Molally wouldn’t have that at all ; why would 
she, a fine, able woman she was, at that time? And 
she never cared for Margaret a bit the way she did 
for Larry. 

But all her plans failed with the poor woman. 
Her heart’s darling, Larry, went off, without even 
saying good-bye to her or any one in the old 
home . . . of course, he might have been ashamed, 
seeing he was robbing them at the same time ; and 
Margaret was left with her, the daughter that she 
would have given cheerfully, body and bones, for 
Larry’s little finger. And all the savings of years 
gone too. 

With things like that, Margaret made up her 


196 The Folk of Furry Farm 

mind to give no more encouragement to Ratigan, 
at least for a while. Still, she would scarcely have 
broken with him the way she did, if she had seen 
him soon after Larry disappeared. Her heart was 
very sore then, not alone the disappointment and 
disgrace about Larry, but the way the mother was 
taking it, as if she was inclined to lay blame upon 
Marg herself. 

Ratigan had the fashion of strolling up of an 
evening to Molally’s, on the chance of meeting 
Marg out through the fields; for she used to go 
through them, to count the cattle, to save her 
father from walking all the land, when maybe he 
would be feeling tired. Marg did that faithfully 
for him, and I need not say, it came all the easier 
to her when Patsy Ratigan would join her and have 
a chat with her. 

She never knew, till after Larry went, how much 
she used to count on seeing Ratigan ; for although 
she had no intention of telling him, or any one else, 
all that had taken place, it would have cheered her 
to have a word with some one young like herself, 
and that would have been able to speak of other 
things. The old people could do nothing but fret. 

But Ratigan never came, for over a week. It 
was really nothing worse than a bit of a spree that 


A Settled Girl 


197 


he was on, as had often occurred before, without 
Margaret’s knowing exactly what was going on. 
But to have it happen now! Margaret thought 
the wide world was overshadowed by their trouble, 
and she could not understand why Ratigan did not 
come to help to lighten it for her. 

So she was half wild with grief and longing and 
disappointment the evening that Larry did at last 
appear again. 

“Good-evening, Marg,” he called out to her, 
where she was standing in a wide pasture field; 
“let me get beyant them bullocks for you, and 
head them back. . . . You’re a bit late, aren’t 
ye?” 

She was, and it was growing dusk. 

“I’m obliged to ye, ” said Marg, feeling her face 
stiffening as she spoke; “but when I want help, 
I’ll ask it!” 

“What’s astray with ye?” 

“Nothing in life,” she said, raising her eyes to 
Patsy’s face, and he looked so smiling and careless 
that she could not stop herself from going on, 
“only I’m of the opinion that every one should 
mind their own business!” 

“I’ll be making off with meself, in that case,” 
said Ratigan. 


198 The Folk of Furry Farm 

“You might do worse,” said Margaret. 

And all the time, she could have bitten her 
tongue out, that said such bitter things to him. 

Ratigan was said to be a “bit short in the 
temper. ” But any one might have been vexed at 
what Marg had said then. He just turned off, and 
went away, without another word. And not long 
afterwards, Margaret heard that he, too, had 
quitted out for America. 

There were people to say, that Patsy Ratigan 
had reasons of his own for going, and that he didn’t 
leave until he could not do anything else. But 
Margaret knew nothing of that. Girls never do 
know half the queer things that the boys are up to ! 
If they did, there would be more of them sitting 
contentedly at home, and better off there, than 
marrying. But they won’t believe that, nor 
wouldn’t, if you were to put your eyes upon sticks! 

No, Marg knew nothing of Patsy’s wild doings. 
She thought he went away because she had spoken 
so coldly to him that evening. And though she 
often said to herself, that it was better so, and 
that anyway, on account of the money being gone, 
she would have had to give him up, still . . . ! 

Many and many a night, when all the world was 
asleep around her, Margaret would be lying awake, 


A Settled Girl 


199 


and would cry a sackful, thinking of Patsy, and 
wondering would he meet Larry, for weren’t they 
both in America! And had she any right to be 
short with him? 

She had done it all for the best, but even that 
won’t keep you from fretting, when a thing is past, 
and you feel that you went against your own heart, 
and still, you have room to wonder, were you right? 
or would it have been better to have left it alone? 

But Almighty God doesn’t ever bring back the 
past. Of course, He could, if He chose; but all 
we know is, that He never does. Marg was often 
heart-sick, going over what had been said, between 
herself and Ratigan, that evening in the pasture 
field. And it was long enough before she gave up 
fancying that if only she looked down the boreen 
at dusk, she would see Ratigan going along home 
from his work, with his coat thrown loosely across 
his shoulders, and he whistling, and jigging a step 
now and then. Patsy was as lovely a dancer of a 
reel as you need ask to see. Margaret then did her 
best to stop thinking about him at all. 

“ I’ll not expect to hear a word afore Hollintide ! ” 
she would say to herself, and begin maybe count- 
ing eggs she would be about bringing to Melia’s 
shop. Then it was, “afore the Chrisemas”; and 


200 The Folk of Furry Farm 

then “Shrove Tuesday.” So she wore the time 
away, measuring it by the Saints’ -days and holi- 
days. But not a sign did Ratigan make. 

Not long after, the mother died; and with this 
new loss, the sharpness of the pain round her heart 
about Patsy began to wear off, by degrees. One 
consolation she had ; not one but herself and Rati- 
gan ever knew that they had been “speaking”; 
as far as she could tell. 

So the years rolled on, and Marg Molally was 
getting to be what you might call a “settled girl”; 
quieter and more retired on herself than ever. She 
seemed to have no wish for doing anything, except 
minding the old father and their little place. And 
she was beginning to grow more contented, every 
day that passed over her head. She had plenty to 
keep her going, from dawn till dark ; and, moreover, 
her heart was in her work, for she was kind to every 
living thing under her care. 

“It’s pets Marg makes, out of even the ducks 
she rears!” the neighbours would say. “Blue 
ribbons you’ll see next, tied round the lambs’ 
necks! sich nonsense to be getting on with! as if 
she wouldn’t have enough to do, without that 
foolishness!” 

Whether she ever went so far as that or not, I 


A Settled Girl 


201 


can’t say ; but whatever she had, throve ahead. And 
as for the young lambs that she would rear on the 
cup, wouldn’t any one be fond of them ! To see how 
they’ll run races with one another, a whole flock of 
them! and play up and down a sunny bank! Any 
one would feel delighted to be watching them. 

And a lone woman like Marg has her feelings, 
just the same as one that has a houseful of children. 
If you try to stop spring water from running its 
own course, won’t it take and bubble out by some 
other vent? And so by Marg. She had to be 
caring for something. And she did it well; and, 
signs on it, there was a look of comfort and order 
about her little home, that every one noticed. And 
money’s worth had gathered there, too; though of 
course the old stocking that Larry had emptied had 
never been filled again. Above all, the old father 
was cherished and made happy, in every way that 
was possible. Marg thought nothing a trouble that 
she could do for him. In fact, nothing was any 
trouble to her, that he wished done. Love makes 
easy labour. 

Then he died; and lonesome and fretted was 
Margaret, when she found herself without him, 
and not knowing where she would turn to make 
herself a home again. 


202 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

And still she found herself going off to the wed- 
ding at Dempsey’s that had occasioned so much 
talk at Ardenoo. Marg went, but she kept herself 
very quiet all through. There was a great deal 
that wanted doing at Dempsey’s that day, what 
with the helpless old woman and everything else; 
and Marg would rather be putting her hand to 
business such as getting dinner ready, or putting 
down the fire, than to be mixed up with the young 
boys and girls and their jokes and fun. 

That is how it happened that scarcely any one 
that was there took notice of Margaret ; and 
Heffeman in particular knew nothing of her being 
there among the other people, until he had done 
the dance with Kitty. It was no right thing to do, 
to persuade a man like Mickey that was on in 
years, and stiff, as well as lame of one leg, till they 
got him out on the floor to dance, just to raise a 
laugh. But what do young people think of only to 
get their bit of fun where they can! 

When the dance was over, Heffeman was ready 
to drop, puffing and blowing, and he staggered 
over to where Dark Moll was sitting, playing her 
fiddle, with Margaret close beside her. Up she 
jumped at sight of Mickey, to leave a seat empty 
for the poor old fellow; and the way he would not 


A Settled Girl 


203 


be thinking that she did that on purpose, she said, 
“ Now that’s over, we may as well be getting ready 
another round of tay; dancing is drouthy work!” 

So she went over to the hearth, to take up the 
teapot out of the ashes where she was keeping it 
warm; and Dan Grennan was standing there, and 
talking about all the sights and queer ways he met 
in America. 

“And who should I bob up against, only last 
winter, ” he went on, “but a near neighbour of our 
own here . . . one of the Ratigans . . . yous 
remember Patsy?” 

At that word, Margaret turned very white, and 
she stooped down, as if she wanted to rake the 
ashes together. And said some one, “How is 
Patsy doing out there? Has he anny intentions of 
coming home for a wife, like yourself?” 

“Och, the divil an intention!” said Dan; “sure, 
isn’t he well settled in there already? He’s marrit 
this len’th of time; to a widdy woman with a fine 
shop and a family too. ...” 

Marg raised herself up then, and her face was 
blazing, and her eyes like coals of fire. But she said 
nothing; only went back, quiet and easy, to the 
comer where she had been sitting, and began by 
offering the first of the tea to Heffeman. And 


204 The Folk of Furry Farm 


when he had it taken, he looked up at Marg, very 
gratefully. 

“ That’s good!” he said; “ that's the way I 
like tay ! hot and sweet, and that strong, you could 
raddle lambs with it!” 

Truth to tell, there was no scarcity nor meanness 
of any kind at that wedding; Dark Moll found it 
hard to carry away her share of what was left over, 
when every one had had enough. 

In spite of what she got, and the good treatment 
she met with, she was discontented in her own 
mind. For do what she would, she could not get 
Margaret into discourse with the boy she had laid 
out for her. But Moll was as steadfast as a weasel 
to any plan that ever she formed. 

It might have been a month or more after the 
wedding at the Dempseys’, that Mickey HefTeman 
was outside in front of his house, sitting on the bit 
of old wall, because the height of it just favoured 
the game leg, and enabled him to rest himself with- 
out having to stoop. He was feeling lonesome, and 
looking as forgotten as a hen without a tail. Small 
blame to him, if he did feel down in the mouth! 
after the trick that was played on him, and that 
lost him the fine young wife he thought to bring 
home to the Furry Farm. And then, to make it 


A Settled Girl 


205 


worse, to see how simply little Barney Maguire 
could get a woman! and one that seemed suitable 
every way you looked at it. 

Mickey had been there for some time, when he 
heard a cough. He looked round, and who was it, 
a few perch away on the road, but Dark Moll. 

“Hi!” shouted Mickey to her; “where are you 
off to, in such a murthering hurry, Moll?” 

“Who's that, that’s calling me, in the name of 
God?” said Moll, in a small, weak kind of a voice, 
as if she was frightened at hearing him. 

“Sure it’s only me . . . Mr. Heffernan,” said 
Mickey ; 1 1 who else ? ’ ’ 

“The Lord save us! and is it a-by the Furry 
Farm I am?” 

“Where else?” said Mickey. 

“Well, now, isn’t it the poor case to have no use 
of your eyes, ” said Moll. 

But well she knew where she was! and had in- 
tended in her own mind to get a chance of talking 
to the boy, Jack Rorke, that she wanted for Marg, 
and thought might be with Heffernan yet. And 
along with that, she thought of having a chat with 
Heffernan himself to see if he would be willing to 
put in a good word for Jack, and recommend him 
for the herding that Marg was to be put out of, 


206 The Folk of Furry Farm 


now the father was dead. For Heffernan being 
a respectable, well-thought-of person, a character 
from him would be worth having. 

“Come along in, Moll,” said Heffernan, “and 
give us any news that’s going!” 

“I’ll take a sate, and be thankful to ye, Mr. 
Heffernan,” said Moll. “But for news . . . 
sorra bit of ‘ chaw-the-rag ’ there is to be had, as 
far as poor ould Moll can tell!” 

Moll knew that scarcely anything was being 
spoken over still at that time, in all Ardenoo, 
but the wedding at Dempsey’s; and she didn’t 
want to let Heffernan hear of that through her. 

“And how did ye get this far?” asked Mickey. 

“Shanks’ mare,” answers Moll. “Stopping be- 
low there at Molally’s I was last night and 
thought to get carried, with Marg and the ass, 
when they went off to the fair this morning. But 
at the last minute, she made up her mind to part 
them twin calves of hers, if she could get any kind 
of a price for them. Sure she doesn’t know what 
way to turn, the crathur, and annoyed she is try- 
ing to think what to do, and she having to quit out 
of her own little place ... so there was only 
room for the two little bastes in the cart, and her 
and me had to walk; we parted company a piece 


A Settled Girl 


207 


off and she went along on to the fair, and I was to 
wait about ... I had no wish to go any farther, 
not feeling too well. . . . And I wonder what luck 
poor Marg is having, or did she sell at all? I hear 
there’s a big droop in the price of all stock. But 
sure, it’s better for a body be moving somewhere, 
even if it’s only to get you a prod of a thorn in the 
toe!” 

“Marg? that’ll be a dauther of old Molally’s 
bey ant, that is only after dying?” said Heffernan. 

“The very person,” said Moll; “nice and even- 
going and quiet, and the girl the same. And not 
one in it now, only herself!” 

“ It’s a poor thing, to be with only a body’s self, 
then!” said Mickey; “the same as me; I haven’t 
one about the place inside or out, but meself ; and 
I wanting to go to the fair to look for a couple or 
three calves and pigs. But how could I and leave 
the house without one to keep an eye on things 
here, while I’d be away!” 

“ Do you tell me that? why, where’s your sarvint 
boy, Jack Rorke it was you had lastly!” 

“Gone!” says Heffernan; “he gave me impi- 
dence; said, indeed, that he had no notion of 
lighting the fire or swinging on a pot to boil . . . 
that it was girl’s work I was expecting of him. So 


208 The Folk of Furry Farm 

with that, I let out, and hit him a ding in the face. 
I thought to give him a knuckle in the throat, but 
it was the jaw-bone I struck; and see the way it 
left me! But sure I forgot; you can’t see that, or 
anything else!” 

“The Lord help you!” said Moll, very pityingly. 
“And where is Jack?” 

“ I never laid an eye on him since, ” said Heffer- 
nan, indifferently; then, getting confidential, “I’m 
disappointed and put about, every way! Look at 
me now, and I after getting all the house white- 
washed, and even a fresh load of gravel thrown 
down before the door . . . and a new leg after 
going into the kitchen table . . . and all that 
trouble and expense gone, for nothing as a body 
might say!” 

“You may say that!” said Moll; “things do 
turn out very contrairy betimes, and let people do 
their best endayvours! Here now,” she went on, 
“is a pair of stockings I’m after knitting for Jack 
that’s a third cousin of me own . . for she 
wanted now to make some excuse up for having 
come there at all; “but now, as he’s not with you, 
I dunno will I give them to him at all!” 

“He’s not worthy of them,” said Mickey, eye- 
ing the stockings in Moll’s hand, and from them 


A Settled Girl 


209 


looking down to where his own were showing above 
the rims of his brogues, and thinking that there 
was scarcely an inch of the same stockings but was 
holes, for the want of some woman to dam them 
for him; “Jack’s not worthy of them. But as you 
have them this far, if you’d sooner not be having 
to carry them back again, you can just leave them 
here, and I’ll see to make some use of them. ” 

“They’d not be suitable for your wear, Mr. 
Heffernan,” said Moll; “just only coarse, plain 
knitting of me own pattern. ...” Moll had no 
wish to let Mickey have them at all. He was 
known to be a bit near and “grabbish”; and she 
knew he’d not give her more than maybe a handful 
of meal or a few potatoes for the stockings. 

“Och, they’re not too bad at all,” said Heffer- 
nan. He liked nothing better than to get some- 
thing for nothing. So Moll then changed her 
tune. 

“Well, sure you’re welcome to them! or any- 
thing else I’d have, only they’re not good enough 
. . . but a poor ould body like me, it’s little I have 
at any time. . . . And is it gone for good Jack 
Rorke is?” she said. 

“Good or bad, he’s gone out of this; and far 
better off I am, without him or the likes of him!” 


14 


2io The Folk of Furry Farm 


said Mickey; “he’s as stupid as a kishful of 
brogues. And lazy along with all!” 

Heffeman went on talking like this, never re- 
membering that Moll had said Jack was a cousin 
of hers. But he was a bit stupid himself, as well 
as the boy he was abusing. And Moll was too cute 
to let him see if she was vexed. Anyway, what did 
she care about Jack? and in particular when it was 
from a man like Heffeman that the talk and fault- 
finding was coming. 

“He was fit for nothing in life, ” Mickey went on, 
“only standing about, watching a hen to go lay! 
I’m well rid of Jack ! But I’ll have to get some one 
in his place! I’m not all out as souple as I used 
to be!” 

Well, that minute a new plan came into Moll’s 
mind. She saw only too plainly that Jack Rorke 
would have no chance of a character from Heffer- 
nan; and without that, from the last man that 
had employed him, Jack would never get the 
herding. 

So, as quick as a flash, she began on a new tack. 

“It’s a woman you want here, Mr. Heffeman! 
getting married is what you have a right to be 
thinking about. ...” 

She felt a trifle awkward in saying that word 


A Settled Girl 


21 1 


“married, ” seeing the hand she had had in the 
Dempsey wedding. But Heffeman made her no 
answer. It appeared really as if he never knew 
rightly whether to laugh or to be angry at the 
trick that Moll put Dan and Kitty up to. And, at 
all events, Moll had been so cute over it, that she 
never got the share of blame that was hers by 
right. 

Moll began again, when she saw how quiet 
Mickey took what she said. 

“You're lonesome here, Mr. Heffeman, but I 
know a girl that’s worse off, even! and faith! I’m 
thinking it’s what it’s a pity to be spoiling two 
houses with the pair of yous!” and then she 
stopped. 

Heffeman still said nothing, till he had the pipe 
filled again, and drawing well. Then, when he had 
it going to his liking, he appeared to take heart, 
and he said: “And who might that be? not that 
I’m one for making up me mind in a hurry. ...” 

“You’re right there, too!” said Moll; “and 
above all to be cautious, before you tie a knot 
with your tongue that you can’t unloose with your 
teeth ! But now ... if you were to get word of a 
nice, decent little girl, with a cow, and a couple 
of pigs and . . . not to mention the calves that 


212 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

. . . and as purty a breed of geese as there is in 
Ireland. ...” 

“Well, and who are you talking about?” said 
Mickey, his mouth watering, you’d think, to hear 
of all Marg’s stock. 

“Why, who but Marg Molally!” 

“I have no acquaintance with the girl,” said 
Mickey. 

“Ay, have ye!” said Moll; “isn’t it her was at 
Dempsey’s that night . . . and brought you over 
thetay . . . and aren’t you after hearing all about 
her now from me, too!” 

“Was that her at Dempsey’s?” said Heffernan; 
“and good tay it was, too! She can’t be too 
young?”' 

“No,” said Moll; “but what does a sensible 
man, like yourself, with a place that’s worth look- 
ing after, want with one of them whipsters of girls, 
that would be for ever dressing herself up, and off 
to every wake and wedding in the place. Far 
more comfort there will be with one that would 
have her mind on her business, and be striving to 
keep a man’s things together for him!” 

“I’d always wish to have the place some ways 
decent!” says Mickey. 

“To be sure you would, and why wouldn’t 


A Settled Girl 


213 


ye? Whisht now! is that wheels I hear?” said 
Moll. 

“Faith, I believe so,” said Mickey; “them 
that hasn’t eyes has ears!” 

“That will be Marg, coming back from the 
fair,” said Moll; “and now, Mr. Heffernan, I 
may’s well be cuttin’ me stick and paring it along 
the road, the way I won’t be keeping the poor girl 
waiting on me, below there at the cross-roads. We 
have it laid out that we’ll meet there, when she’s 
on her way home; and I’ll go back with her, to 
be company to her this night, anyway, God help 
her!” 

“I may’s well go that far with you,” says 
Mickey, getting down stiffly from the wall, and 
reaching for the stick that he always had con- 
venient to his hand. 

“In the name of God, then, do so!” said Moll. 

Heffernan meant by that, to get a look at Marg; 
and so he did. For there she was, waiting as Moll 
had said. She was standing by the little ass, with 
her hand on its neck, and her head a bit bowed, 
and the look in her face would put you in mind of 
the picture of the Virgin Mary in the chapel, it 
was so sorrowful and patient. She was tired out, 
with the heat of the day and the noise and con- 


214 The Folk of Furry Farm 

fusion in the fair ; and she had on the big blue cloak 
that came to her from the mother. It was the 
weight of two cloaks, it was so good and heavy. 
And she had a blue handkerchief on her head, tied 
under her chin, and a grand big blue apron, over 
her red skirt, that was made of wool from her own 
sheep, and by her own two hands. Those colours 
were in the picture, too. 

She and Heffernan passed the time of day with 
one another; and then he asked, ‘ ‘Is it buying or 
selling you were to-day?” 

“Striving to sell, I was,” said Margaret; “but 
could get no price worth while; and besides I 
hadn’t it in my heart to part those two little 
calves, unless I got a real good offer for them! 
But now I’m wishful that I had got shut of them, 
at any money, and not have to bring them home, 
and the poor ass gone lame on me!” 

“Lame, is she?” said Mickey; and he hobbled 
over, to have a look at what was wrong; and hard 
set he was to stoop to look at the donkey’s feet, he 
was so stiff. 

“ She is so, lame, and very lame ! ” said Marg; “as 
lame as a duck; I doubt will she ever get home 
to-night, and then what will I do, at all at all!” 

She looked ready to cry. 


A Settled Girl 


215 


Heffernan stood and thought ; and Moll watched 
him as if she had her sight, thinking to herself, 
“ If only you’d let me manage the thing for ye!” 

But Moll knew when to hold her tongue. 

At last, said Heffernan, “ If it would be any con- 
vaniency to you to leave ass and calves at my 
place, there a piece up the boreen, until the lame- 
ness wears off, sure, why not, and welcome!” 

Margaret said nothing for a minute, but while 
she was thinking what to answer that would be 
suitable, Moll struck in her word, “ Sure, that’s the 
great plan, all out, of yours, Mr. Heffernan!” 

“That ass,” Mickey went on, “will never get 
the cart and its burden home to-night!” 

Marg looked the ass all over, and even led her 
on a few paces, to see if it was only that she was 
pretending ; for asses have their tricks betimes like 
that. But it was worse she was by then, scarcely 
able to keep on her feet at all. 

So Margaret gave in to what Heffernan said; 
and they all turned about, and went up to the 
Furry Farm. A fine, comfortable place it was, too, 
as far as sheds and hay and straw went, all very 
complete and plentiful. 

So there was no delay in finding room for all 
Margaret’s belongings, and settling them in great 


2 16 The Folk of Furry Farm 

comfort. And then Heffernan said, “ If yous would 
step inside, I’ll be pleased to have your company 
to tay.” 

“ Troth and we will! it’s meself that’s very 
drouthy wid the great heat of the day. . . . And 
that God may reward ye, Mr. Heffernan, for the 
kind thought!” said Moll, beginning to speak very 
free, and then ending humbly, when she thought of 
herself. But any one like Moll that has to look 
out for themselves doesn’t like to lose the chance 
of a stray meal. It was different with Marg. Still, 
she did not wish to seem unfriendly with the man 
that had just been so good-natured to her; so she 
and Moll went into the kitchen, Mickey showing 
them the way. 

The look of it ! Everything was in a muddle ; the 
remains of the dinner on the table; the floor not 
swept over; not a thing washed up, you’d think, 
for a month of Sundays; hens picking about, and 
the dog with his nose into the pig’s pot. 

“Go ’long out o’ that!” said Mickey, making a 
whack at him with the stick. He lost his balance 
and down he fell, with his head into the fire, only 
as luck would have it, it was out. 

“Och, murther! I’m kilt!” he cried. 

“The Lord save us!” said Margaret; and she 


A Settled Girl 


2x7 


ran over, to pull him out of the fire, as she sup- 
posed. She had a fine strong arm; and she had 
him raised in no time. 

“Are you much hurted?” she asked, in great 
concern. 

“The sorra hurt,” he said; “but only for 
you. ...” 

He was trembling all over. Any one on in years 
will feel a fall like that to be a great shock. 

“Sit down there, a minute or two,” said Mar- 
garet, and she pulled over a big chair, and put him 
into it. It chanced to be the very chair he always 
sat in. 

“Rest yourself now, and I’ll do what’s re- 
quired. ...” 

That was always the way with Margaret. If 
anything had to be done, she didn’t stop to ask, 
“Whose business is it?” and neither would she 
interfere. But if she saw no one else making a 
move, then she did the thing herself, and without 
making any talk about it. 

Besides that, she felt very sorry for old Mickey, 
seeing him so helpless. As long as he was mov- 
ing about, and had his stick, he managed right 
enough. But without it, and lying as he did after 
the fall, he was as helpless as an infant. 


218 The Folk of Furry Farm 

“I believe the fire is black out, this minute!” 
said Heffernan, beginning to laugh, and half 
ashamed of the fright he had got, when he fell, 
and only into cold ashes. 

“Sure it won’t long be so!” said Margaret; 
and she set to work and in no time she had a 
blazing hearth, and the kettle on the boil. 

“Do I hear the water sizzling out into the fire 
already,” said Moll; “that’s a good sign of you, 
Marg!” 

“How so?” said Marg. 

“Sure, doesn’t all the world know that when a 
girl has good success with a fire, and it kindles up 
quick for her, that’s a certain sign that her ‘boy’ 
is thinking of her!” 

Marg’s face fell, but neither Heffernan nor old 
Moll perceived the change in her. So she pulled 
herself together, and got the supper ready for the 
three of them, as if she had been used to the house 
all her life. And when they were done, she washed 
up and put all straight, while another would be 
thinking about it; and Heffernan sat in his big 
chair, with the pipe in his mouth, and watched 
Marg moving about, and looked very contented. 

“That’s something like, now!” was all he said. 
But he was remembering his sister Julia, and how 


A Settled Girl 


219 


smart and hard-working she had been; too much 
so, in fact! because there were days when herself 
and her besom would be too much for Mickey, 
and he would have no peace anywhere in the house. 
Still, he didn’t like the dirt and confusion, now 
that Julia was gone. So that’s why he enjoyed 
seeing Marg putting the things in order again. 

When she had it all finished, it was beginning to 
grow dusk, and said Heffernan, “It’s a long step 
for yous to be getting home,” meaning Molally’s, 
“and it’s middling late, and there’s the chance of 
people along the road that might be a bit rough 
and noisy, after the fair. So I’ll just throw the 
harness, on the ould mare, and drive ye back.” 

That took place; but the only word he said 
that night of what might be in his mind was when 
Moll and he had a word together, in a whisper, 
after he had driven them up to the very door 
of Molally’s and Marg had gone to the back of 
the house, for the key that she had hidden there 
under a bunch of thistles. 

Said Moll, “She becomes a side-car well!” 

And he answered, “It’s a true word you’re 
saying!” By that, Moll thought things were 
going as she wished. 

No man ever was so tender of a lame ass as 


220 The Folk of Furry Farm 

Mickey was of Marg Molally’s, keeping her there, 
and feeding her on the best of hay and even oats. 
And when Margaret would make inquiries about 
her, he never would agree that she was fit to travel, 
yet. So there he kept her, and the two calves; 
because they had to wait, till the ass would be well 
enough to bring them back to Marg. 

This is how things were, when Margaret got at 
last the news she had been expecting so long; 
that the new herd was hired, and that she would 
have to clear out as soon as she could. She knew, 
of course, that it had to be. But that did not 
hinder her from feeling very fretted and lonesome, 
thinking of the little home she was to leave, where 
she had lived all her life, and had worked so hard. 
So she had no great heart for the bride’s-party 
that was being given for Kitty and Dan Grennan 
at Big Cusack’s, just about then. But she had 
promised Kitty that she’d go; and Margaret 
Molally never was one to go back of her word. 

Who was there, only Mickey HefTernan! As it 
turned out, the party was meant for him, too, to 
try and bring him and Marg together. Dark Moll 
had set the notion going, and all she spoke to 
agreed it would only be right. 

Marg was as innocent as the child unborn of 


A Settled Girl 


221 


what was going on. Her mind was full of other 
things; between thinking how best she could lend 
a hand that evening, and wondering what was be- 
fore herself, and she without a home, when she'd 
be only a few days older ! So she never perceived 
what Moll and Cusack and others as well were up 
to, trying to help out Mickey's courting ... if 
you could call it so ! 

“Did j’ever see two so hard to get into hoults 
with one another?" said Dan to Kitty. 

“You can’t get Marg to see what he’s after!" 
said she; “she has no more intelligence of what 
Mickey wants ..." 

“Not like some . . . !” said Dan. 

“Have behaviour, now," said Kitty, pretending 
to be angry; “but of all the simple girls . . . !" 

Maybe that was just as well. For if Margaret 
had ever suspected what was being thought about 
her and Heffernan, would she have done what she 
did? Would she have come for vard, when Mickey 
was leaving, to help him on with his big frieze 
coat? And then, when no que else made a move, 
would she go out of the ho vise after him, and over 
to where his car was, to help him up on it? Indeed, 
she felt puzzled and half indignant that none of the 
others offered to do anyching for the crippled old 


222 


The Folk of Furry Farm 

man. But they were holding back, out of good- 
nature; while Margaret’s heart was swelling with 
pity for him, and anger at their indifference. 

“To think that Dan and the whole of them are 
there! and they well knowing . . . but when 
people is engaged with sport for themselves, they 
forget very easy!” she ended, as with a great deal 
to do, she got Mickey ready for the road. 

“I’m obliged to ye!” said Heffernan, that never 
used two words where one would do. 

“It’s little enough, after all you done for me!” 
Margaret made answer. 

Then he dropped his stick and she picked it up 
and handed it to him on the car. 

“I’d be badly off, without that!” he said. 

She saw that he had the rug just laid loose across 
his knees, and she tucked it well about him. 

“That’s the good thought!” he said; “if I 
get anyways chilled, the pain does be bad on 
me!” 

“The nights do bo. cold enough,” said Marg. 

She put the reins into his hand, and still he did 
not move, only sat there, looking very helplessly 
down at Marg, as she stood beside him. 

“Them calves of youm is doing lovely, with me 
at the Furry Farm!” he snid then. 


A Settled Girl 


223 


“I’m proud to hear it, and very thankful to 
you, Mr. Heffernan!” 

“Ora, what about it! but I’m thinking, this 
len’th of time, that ye might do worse than to 
come and be looking after them yourself . . 
and then he dropped the stick again. 

“I’m sorry to be troublesome to ye, about them, 
for so long, ” said Marg, picking up the stick again 
for him, “ but if only I ...” 

“. . . If you’d come, for good and all,” said 
Mickey, “to mind them calves . . . and . . . 
and everything else about the place, that’s going 
to rack and ruin ... all for the want of a woman 
there. ... So . . . I’m middling old now, but, 
sure, I can wait a bit . . . maybe you couldn’t 
bring your mind to take me at all . . . only if 
you’d turn it over in your mind ...” 

Margaret started at that, as if a shot had been 
fired off, close to her ear. She turned red. At last 
she understood what he was driving at. Then she 
grew white, and dizzy. . 

But her mind flew over everything! her home 
gone, and she left, lonely and desolate, without a 
soul she cared for, to be looking after and working 
for. 

She looked up at Heffernan on the car, and the 


224 The Folk of Furry Farm 

sight of him, with his eyes fixed on her as if his life 
depended on what answer she would make . . . 
and above all the useless foot hanging loose as he 
sat balanced there, helpless, just as she had settled 
him . . . these things melted Margaret’s heart. 

“You’ll . . . you’ll think of it, maybe!” said 
Mickey, anxiously. 

“Think!” said Margaret; “and what else do I 
be doing, only think!” and she laughed even as 
she went on : “ But it’s an ould saying I often heard, 
* Thinking’s poor wit!’” and she ended with an- 
other laugh, that had a sob in it, too. 

“Then you’ll agree?” said Heffernan. 

“At your request!” said Margaret. 

There now is the whole account of how Heffer- 
nan got a wife at long last, to bring into the Furry 
Farm. Of course there was talk about it. Some 
said Mickey was just caught on the rebound, and 
took Marg after losing the other girls. 

“I b’lieve meself,” said Dan to Kitty, “it’s 
what Mickey couldn’t find it in his heart to see 
them two calves leaving the Furry Farm; and 
neither did he wish to have to pay Marg for them ! 
Wasn’t it cheaper on him marry her and have them 
for nothing? let alone a girl like her to take care of 
them and him and all he has!” 


A Settled Girl 


225 


“ That’s no right way to be talking!” said 
Kitty; “won’t they both be the better of one 
another? and if they don’t live happy, that you 

and I may!” 
is 


CHAPTER VII 


AN AMERICAN VISITOR 

The talk about Heffernan being married at last 
had all died away, and Marg was well settled in at 
the Furry Farm, busy and contented, looking after 
the house and her old man there, when another 
affair arose at Ardenoo that was the cause of a 
great deal of unpleasantness and worry. 

A stranger from America turned up there; at 
least, that’s what he said he was, and no one for 
long enough knew anything different. But it was 
really Patsy Ratigan, no less, that had left Ardenoo 
years upon years before, and in too great a hurry 
to leave any message to say why or where he was 
going. Now he was back, and feeling none too sure 
what kind of welcome would be waiting for him. 
So he thought, when he got there, the day after he 
landed from America, that he’d keep himself quiet, 
till he saw how the thing would go on. 

The place looked to Patsy wider and more si- 
lent than ever ; the people fewer, and any he met, 
226 


An American Visitor 


227 


either they didn’t know him, or he couldn’t put a 
name upon them. That was just what he wanted, 
really; and still, he thought it very strange that 
everything was so changed from his recollection of 
it! He forgot that the world and all it contains 
must always be moving. If you come back to a 
place you left, even a very short time before, you’ll 
always find something not the same as it was. If 
it’s only a kettle that you leave swinging over the 
fire, while you run out for a few sprigs to hurry it to 
boil, it won’t be the same when you come in again. 
The water will be hotter or colder; the fire will be 
stronger or maybe gone black out. 

Patsy should have bethought himself of the 
length of time he had been away, and then he 
wouldn’t have been so put out, to find things 
different. And, indeed, whatever change he saw 
in Ardenoo, there was more upon himself! Hard- 
set any of the neighbours would have been, even 
the comrade-boys that knew him best in the old 
wild days, to make out the thin rake of a fellow, 
ragged and light, that he used to be, in this big, 
stout, heavy-looking man. And he dressed, 
moreover, in black glossy clothes and a slouch 
hat ; and with a gold watch-chain and ring upon 
him. 


228 The Folk of Furry Farm 

Grand indeed Patsy looked! And still, as well- 
appearing as he was, sitting resting himself by the 
side of the road, he was very uneasy in his mind. 
For he was thinking that he was on the last of his 
cigars, and wondering in his own mind how he was 
going to knock out another smoke, let alone any 
other little necessary comfort he might want. 
Very downhearted he was, and was feeling as 
lonesome as a milestone without a number upon it, 
when somebody else came in sight, walking along 
very brisk, although with a stick. 

“I should know that person, anyway!” said 
Ratigan to himself; “she seems familiar. . . . 
Why, if it isn’t Dark Moll Reilly! And she with 
the ould shawl . . . and the fiddle under it, on 
her back . . . and all the ould bags hanging round 
her, to gather whatever she’s given. . . . She’s apt 
to have all the news of the place ... if there is 
any to know ! If I can get chatting with her . . . 
and she’ll not see who I am. ...” 

So when she got near where he was, he called out 
to her : 

“Hi! you there! my good woman! where are 
you off to?” 

At the words, Moll stopped short, and began 
poking with the stick, as if to feel her way. It was 


An American Visitor 


229 


as if hearing the voice had put a “blind” upon 
poor Moll ; like the bit of board, or old cloth, you’ll 
see sometimes fastened across the face of a beast 
that is a rogue, to keep it from straying out of its 
own pasture. 

“ I ask yer pardon, sir, ” she said, “but sure, I’m 
dark, you perceive ! and couldn’t tell, no more nor 
the dead, where y’are or who y’are!” 

With that, she dropped a curtsey, with her back 
to Ratigan, by the way of that she was so con- 
fused. 

“Here!” said Ratigan, getting up, and catching 
her by the hand, “come over here, and sit down, 
and we can have a bit of discourse. . . . Just 
come here I am, from America, only landed 
yesterday. ...” 

“From America! do ye tell me that, sir!” said 
Moll; “and are well acquainted with these parts, 
are you, sir?” 

“Never set foot here, till now!” said Ratigan; 
“ I just took me grip in me hand, and started off on 
this trip. And some friends of mine across the 
herring-pond were most anxious I should visit 
Ardenoo, and look up some old connections of 
theirs, and bring them all the news. . . . It’s 
when you’re away awhile from a place that you’ll 


230 The Folk of Furry Farm 

be feeling queer and lonesome for them you left 
behind there!” 

Ratigan was always ready for any kind of play- 
acting, and he could tell lies as easy as a dog can 
trot. He had made up this story, while Moll was 
groaning and letting herself down upon the bank 
beside him, very cautiously. 

“Blind, are you? that’s a hard case!” he went 
on; “but I dare say you’ll be able to give me the 
information I require. I have all the names I was 
to ask after, wrote down here in my pocket-book, ” 
he said, pretending to take one out of his breast, 
but all he had there was an old purse and it empty. 
“D . . . D . . . Dempsey . . . ay, that’s the 
name of one . . . queer names, the most of them 
are! Now, what about them?” 

“Och, the Dimpseys!” said Moll; “why, the 
sorra one of that family is left in the old place! by 
that name, at least. The last of them, little Kitty, 
took and married a boy . . . Dan Grennan it is 
. . . and he after coming home from America. 
. . .You never chanced to meet up wid a boy of 
the name, out there, sir?” 

“Never heard it, till this minute!” he said. 

“Well, Grennan came home, and just was in 
time to get Kitty, that was very near marrit upon 


An American Visitor 


231 


old Heffernan of the Furry Farm. . . . And in 
luck Dan was, too, to get his head in there at 
Dempsey’s . , . and a nice little girl for a wife he 
got, when he did cut his good days short, marrying 
at all!” 

“Married young, did he?” said Ratigan. 

“Ay, did he; and a very decent, quiet man he 
is, and always was; so that Kitty didn’t get the 
worst of it ! They’re not to say too out-of-the-way 
rich ; for whatever little money Dan brought home 
with him out of America didn’t stand them long. 
But God was good to Kitty ; is sending her the full 
up of the house of childher; and nineteen turkeys 
she has, this year, let alone two pigs, and has the 
grass of her cow, for doing the herding for ould 
Heffernan. ...” 

“Heffernan of the Furry Farm?” said Ratigan; 
“that’s another I was to ask about. ... But 
from the description I was given of him, he should 
be a great age by now! Or is he to the good at 
all?” 

“Getting young again he is,” said Moll, “ever 
since he has Marg there to be minding him and the 
place. ...” 

“Marg! what Marg is that?” said Ratigan, a 
bit impatient. 


232 The Folk of Furry Farm 

“Why, who but ould Molally’s dauther!” said 
Moll; “she was none too young, but even so, 
Mickey might be her father. But what won’t a 
girl do, to get where there’s money! And he wid 
a head upon him as grey as a badger!” 

Now the reason Moll spoke like that was, she 
had a spleen in for Marg, because she thought it 
was she herself had made up that fine match for 
Marg, with old Heffeman, and that in consequence 
she ought to be as free to go in and out at the 
Furry Farm as she used to be at Molally’s, before 
Marg had quitted it, to become Mrs. Heffeman. 
But Mickey didn’t like those ways, of having such 
as Moll too frequent visitors in his house; and 
Marg never went against him. 

“As grey as a badger, is he?” says Ratigan; 
“well, sure, there’s some says, the bracketty 1 
bird is the purtiest of the clutch!” 

“Grey; and as lame as a crutch, to the back of 
that!” says Moll; “a cant off the side-car that 
caused it. But Mickey was always weak about the 
legs; bom on a fair-day, as the saying is, with the 
two knees of him boxing for sugar- sticks ! ” 

“ Lame of a leg, and grey in the head ! ” said Rati- 
gan; “that’s a fancy man for a girl to go take!” 

1 Speckled. 


An American Visitor 


233 


“Marg was none too young herself, though 
fresh and active still,” said Moll; “and when all 
fruit fails, welcome haws ! She wanted some one. 
But if you have any wish for more information 
than a poor ould blind body can give you, sir, 
can’t you go give them a call at the Furry Farm? 
They do be mostly always within. ” 

“Well, maybe I would do that,” said Ratigan; 
though not a notion he had of doing any such 
thing. 

So Moll gave him all the directions for finding 
his way, which Ratigan knew as well as she did; 
and then she went off on her own business, leaving 
him sitting still by the roadside. 

“ Divil may care what way you go, for I don’t!” 
said Moll to herself, when she got a piece off from 
Ratigan; “to say he was too mean even to offer 
me the price of a pint, and I as dry as a limekiln, 
telling him all the news! . . . Who is he now, at 
all? For I can’t believe that he’s a stranger in 
these parts. He was too ready with his talk . . . 
and too anxious for news. ...” 

She went on again, another little bit, thinking 
hard. Then, “I have it now!” she thought, 
laughing to herself; “it’s that bright boyo, Patsy 
Ratigan, as sure as God made little apples! And 


234 The Folk of Furry Farm 

the great big size of him now ! The broad red face 
of him! and he the full of his skin; instead of the 
way he was, so thin that there wasn’t as much fat 
upon him as would grease a gimlet! And the 
thick back to his head! and used to have a long 
neck upon him, like a distracted gander peeping 
down a pump-hole to look for poreens !” 1 

Moll, as I said, had better use of her eyes than 
the people thought. Still, she never would have 
known Ratigan again, only that her ears were so 
sharp. It was his voice she knew. 

“And why did he tell that story? It’s terrible 
to be a liar!” thought Moll; “but sure, he must 
have some good reason. . . . Let you say nothing, 
Moll Reilly,” she went on to herself, “until you 
see how the cat jumps. ...” 

Now it was true enough, what Moll had said to 
Ratigan about the Heffemans not often going from 
about their own place. Mickey wasn’t able for 
much travelling, on account of the bad leg; and 
Marg didn’t feel it right to leave him. Besides, 
she had always been one to keep herself to herself. 

The place she went most to was Grennan’s. And 
so it happened some time after Ratigan coming 
back, though no word of that had reached the 

1 Small potatoes. 


An American Visitor 


235 


Furry Farm, that Marg said one evening to 
Mickey, “I have an occasion for going over to 
Grennan’s . . . some eggs that Kitty is gathering 
for me . . . and now, I have the churning done, 
and the butter made and all cleared away. So 
I’ll bring a sup of the fresh buttermilk with me, 
for it’s always welcome in a house like theirs; and 
it the Hallow Eve and all. ...” 

Dan Grennan had got in on Dempsey’s farm 
when he married Kitty. But it was a small hold- 
ing, and not worth much, by the time all the older 
girls had been fortuned off it. And though Dan 
had brought some money home with him out of 
America, it didn’t stand long, between rent that 
was owing, and then old Mrs. Dempsey having to 
be buried, when her time came ; and of course Dan 
wanted to do the decent thing by Kitty’s mother. 
So when all that was attended to, there wasn’t 
much coming in, and Dan was glad enough to 
undertake the herding of the Furry Farm for 
Heffernan. It lay convenient to their own little 
place, too. 

Marg had another reason for wanting to go to 
Grennan’s that same evening, but she didn’t want 
Mickey to know anything about it just then. 

“Well, go, in the name of God!” said Heffernan, 


236 The Folk of Furry Farm 


to her standing ready to start; “and as you are 
going, you might as well throw an eye over that 
young stock that I have there bey ant. Dan is 
good, and very good; but it’s the master’s eye that 
puts meat upon his beasts, and I’m not able this 
len’th of time to be going across fields and rough 
ways. ...” 

“Whatever you say yourself, I’ll do,” said his 
wife. 

Marg never had any wish for going outside of 
her own work or interfering with what belongs to 
men. But she would not disagree with any word 
Mickey said. To give him his due, neither did he 
interfere with her. He was only too contented and 
happy to have her there, kind and good and 
peaceable; instead of Julia that had been such a 
heart-scald to him for so long, that he didn’t know 
himself to be the same, since he got shut of her, 
and had Marg to look to for everything. 

She saw him settled comfortably by the fire, 
with his pipe for company, before she set off, with 
her can swinging by her side; and, moreover, a 
brave big lump of butter fresh off the churn, swim- 
ming in the milk. She was bringing that a present 
to Kitty, for Marg was very nice and free-handed 
in her ways. But there was no use in speaking of 


An American Visitor 


237 


the butter to Mickey. That might only bring on 
an argument. And a woman has a good right to 
her churn and all that comes out of it. If she 
chooses to give any of it away, why not? And if 
Mickey knew nothing about it, he couldn’t object 
to it. Supposing he had any claim to the butter, 
wouldn’t he be all the better of its being given in 
charity and kindness, and he getting so far on in 
life? And they would never miss it, no, nor twice 
as much. 

Marg was counted a very lucky hand over a 
dairy, and always had good yield from the milk. 
Near though she was to the Furry Hills, that were 
well known to be full up of fairies, she never got 
any annoyance from them, such as the Good 
People to “milk the tether” on her, or to take 
away the value of the milk from her. But of 
course, that mightn’t be luck, so much as that 
Marg knew what she was about. She was very 
particular not to give away anything to a stranger 
that might come borrowing from her on May Day ; 
a mistake that has cost many a woman the loss of 
a fine cow. And she never forgot to throw a grain 
of salt into the churn, before she began to stir the 
dash. And as soon as ever she had the butter 
taken off the churn, she took care to stick the first 


238 The Folk of Furry Farm 

bit against the wall, for the fairies. People can’t 
be too careful in such things, especially if they live 
anyway near such a place as the Furry Hills. 

It was from those hills that Heffernan’s place 
had got its name of the Furry Farm. The hills 
rose up, across his land, steep and sharp, like the 
fin of a fish. High they were, and grown over with 
furze and ferns and brambles and old thorn bushes, 
that of course no one would ask to disturb. But 
anyway, you could never run a plough up such 
hills as they were, so there was no occasion to 
interfere with anything that grew on them. 

In one part of the Furry Hills there was a gap, 
like a cleft, and the old people said it had been 
made there by a fairy sword. A narrow road, no 
more than a boreen, ran through that cleft; and 
hardly any one used it, though it was handy enough 
for many purposes. But there was great talk of 
fairies being thereabouts, and that fairy music 
could be heard there, and so on. It might be, too, 
that the old boreen was deserted because there was 
another road made, better and even handier for 
cattle that would be going to fairs at Ardenoo or 
Balloch. But even before that new road was there, 
the people would never go through the cleft by 
themselves or late at night; and it was used as 


An American Visitor 


239 


seldom as possible. Except for this: not very far 
distant there lay a holy well, that people would go 
to at certain times. But Marg could get across the 
hills to Grennan’s without passing near the cleft 
at all. 

She was supple and strong still, because she gave 
herself no time to get stiff in the limbs, only always 
kept going about something or other. So now it 
was no trouble to her to cross the hills, and strike 
off through the fields to Grennan’s. 

The instant minute after she saw Kitty and they 
had passed the time of day with one another, “Any 
news yet?” asked Marg. 

“The sorra news!” said Kitty; “me heart’s 
broke, so it is, fretting, and Dan the same. And 
he tells me, he heard below there at Melia’s, that 
there’s more cattle gone, the same way, as if the 
earth had opened and swallowed them. No ac- 
count of them to be got, high, low, or holy ! And 
not a night, since Dan missed that bullock out of 
the Big Field here, but there’s a rosary said in this 
house at bedtime, for it to be got back. The Lord 
forgive them that gets on with such work!” 

“Did you ask St. Anthony?” said Marg; “he’s 
great, for things that are lost. I remember to hear 
tell of an old woman that lost her rosary once, and 


240 The Folk of Furry Farm 

she having a great regard for it. So she used to ask 
St. Anthony; and it was a twelvemonth after, she 
went to turn up the mattress of her bed ; and there 
was the rosary!” 

“Look at that, now!” said Kitty; “well, sure, 
we might try him!” 

“You could do no more, then,” said Marg; 
“but . . . there’s the fair-day of Balloch coming 
round . . . and himself might take the notion of 
selling there some of the cattle; and then he’ll 
have to be told about the bullock being lost!” 

“I suppose that will have to be!” said Kitty, 
and she ready to cry; “it can’t be kept from him 
for ever! It was God that done it, that his leg 
got too bad for him to be able to go round the 
place, to see the stock and count them himself, 
this while back!” 

Kitty meant no harm to Mickey by that saying; 
and Marg didn’t think it of her. 

“What way is he now?” Kitty went on; “it’s 
a long time since he took the light from this 
door. ” 

“He’s well enough,” said Marg, “barrin’ for the 
leg, that has been giving him great punishment this 
good while. Only for that, and that I didn’t wish 
to be putting any other annoyance upon him, I 


An American Visitor 


241 


would have told him about the bullock being lost 
before now. ” 

“Wait another little weeny while!” said Kitty, 
coaxingly; “what would we do at all, if he fell out 
with Dan?” 

“Sure don’t I know that well! and have no 
wish in life to be making trouble,” said Marg, 
“carrying stories and telling tales . . . only 
. . . you see, he depends on me to bring him the 
report. ...” 

She sat down then and began watching the 
children, while Kitty hung down the kettle to wet 
a grain of tea. 

“Ora, Kitty,” said Marg, jumping up, “mind 
the child ! the baby will be killed, if you don’t take 
heed ! Little Mag isn’t able to be lifting him. ...” 

The little girl at Grennan’s was called after 
Marg herself, and Kitty used to let her have the 
baby on the floor to nurse him. 

“Och, never fear for them!” said Kitty; “here! 
I’ll put the two of them outside the door with a 
pinch of sugar . . . there now, Maggie; be good 
and don’t be annoying me and I busy with Mrs. 
Heffernan; and take care of the baby. ...” 

Kitty never was one to have much talk about 
her babies, and in particular when Marg that had 

16 


242 The Folk of Furry Farm 

none was by. But Kitty was right, to let them 
mind themselves, and learn to do that, by being 
left alone. If you’re always watching a child, and 
warning it about falling and so on, it will never 
learn to be handy with the little feet or anyway 
independent. 

Kitty settled the children outside, then, and that 
left the kitchen quiet, so that she could give Marg 
the cup of tea in peace and quiet, and have a chat. 

“I suppose,” said Kitty, while she was cooling 
a sup of her tea in the saucer, “I suppose you 
heard tell of the American that’s beyant in 
Clough-na-Rinka? ” 

“How would I hear,” said Marg; “that never 
goes anywhere, except to the chapel, from one 
year’s end to the other!” 

“I wonder at that!” said Kitty, “but there he 
is, this len’th of time, stopping with the Widdah 
Grogan ; and has her heart-scalded, by what I hear, 
with his grand, particular ways! Wanting beef- 
steaks and pie for his dinner, no less! as if he was 
a lord. And as for the talk he does have out of 
him . . . !” 

“Americans does mostly always be that way,” 
says Marg; “quare notions they have, there 
beyant. ...” 


An American Visitor 


243 


“And for all that,” said Kitty, “in ways, you’d 
think him real innocent; don’t ask the use of a 
bedroom at all, so he’s no trouble that way . . . 
go away now, Mags! and don’t be annoying 
me. . . . 

Marg watched, while Kitty hunted the little girl 
again out of the kitchen, to where she had the baby 
laid in a turf-basket; and Marg wondered to her- 
self, how Kitty could bear to have them out of her 
sight. But she said nothing about that, only, 
“Has no bed! that’s a quare way to be going on!” 

“It appears,” Kitty explained, “that this is a 
man that got out of his health there in America, 
and was ordered a voyage across the salt water; 
and he knew people out there, that spoke to him 
of this place, and how quiet and healthy you could 
be here. And above all things, he says, he was 
warned never to sleep under a roof, if he could 
avoid doing so. Well, you know that little canoe 
of a place Mrs. Melia has, squeezed on at the back 
of her house? she keeps a bit of hay in it for the 
pony, and it’s there the American asked to be let 
lie down at night ; says he has to have the fresh air. 
He has a bad foot, too, the crature ! the size of a pot 
it is with all the old rags and bandages he keeps on 
it. Oh, very lame he is, with it, and says he always 


244 


The Folk of Furry Farm 


was, from a child, and had a fortune spent on it, 
but can find no cure. So there’s the way it is with 
him; he appears to have all the money any one 
could require. Stands treat, regular, to the boys 
that gather in to hear his stories, at Melia’s, and 
tells the shop-boy to score all up to him. I’d as 
soon he’d let that part of it alone!” said Kitty; 
“ Dan was a bit too late coming home, a few nights 
ago, and then ...” 

Kitty sighed. 

“It’s a seldom thing for that to occur with 
Dan!” said Margaret. 

“Oh, ay! there’s not much to fault in Dan!” 
said his wife; “only a body gets a bit anxious, for 
fraid he might get the fashion of being late . . . 
maybe begin stravaguing the roads. ...” 

“Well, if the American is the way you say, with 
the bad foot, they’ll not go far, if they want his 
company!” 

“Ay! that’s only God’s truth! and now speak- 
ing of a lame leg and the like, what remedy are you 
trying for Mickey?” 

“Nothing; for there seems no good in anything 
I can apply to give him ease!” said Marg. 

“Did you think of getting the water from the 
Holy Well?” said Kitty. 


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245 


“I thought of that, over and over,” said Marg; 
4 ‘but I never got to try it for him yet. Only this 
evening, and I coming along here, I was intended 
to bring home a sup of the blessed water in the 
buttermilk can. And so I will, too, for I can get it 
easily, on the way back. So as soon as you can 
have the can readied out, I’ll be shortening the way 
home, ” says Marg. 

“I’ll not ask to delay you, so,” said Kitty, “and 
it Hallow Eve and all; and the daylight beginning 
to fade. And cold it’s turning, too!” 

“I’ll not heed that!” said Marg; and away she 
went. 

There was a touch of frost in the air; the grass 
felt crisp underfoot. Dusk was gathering about 
the fields and the shadows began to lie very thick 
and dark under the trees and hedges. Margaret 
even shivered a little, as she hurried on. But that 
might be because all these lonesome signs of the 
night seemed worse, after leaving Kitty’s kitchen, 
gay and full up of the little chatter and laughing of 
the children, the baby in Kitty’s arm, and little 
Maggie standing beside her mother, to watch Mrs. 
Heffeman disappearing into the twilight. Marg 
loved to go to Grennan ’s, and see the children, and 
maybe now and then coax one of them to sit on her 


246 The Folk of Furry Farm 

knee and let her play with it. All the same, she 
was sighing now, to think how silent and sober her 
own house was, compared to Grennan’s. 

She was thinking, going along, of the sound of 
the little voices there; “like music!” she said to 
herself. And with that word, she started. For, 
whether it was some echo carried on the wind from 
Grennan’s, or whatever it might have been, that 
very moment she thought she heard some sound of 
music coming out of the darkness to her as she was 
passing through the Big Pasture Field. 

“What can it be? Sure, I often heard tell of 
fairy music, and how that some can hear noises, 
like piannas and bugles, if they put their ear to 
the ground, close by a rath. But that can only be 
foolishness! I’ll not let the like of that talk stop 
me now, from going to the Holy Well, if there’s a 
cure, or even some small relief to be got there, for 
that poor leg of Mickey’s!” 

So on she went, by the Furry Hills, until she got 
to the Holy Well, close under the Cleft of the 
Fairy Sword. 

“It’s well the moon is up,” thought Marg, 
“the way I’ll have no delay in filling the can!” 

The Holy Well lay in a comer, where the Big 
Pasture Field sloped down to a hollow. Many’s 


An American Visitor 


247 


the time Marg had seen it, of a Saint’s Day, with 
the lone thorn that leans out over the water all 
dressed up with bits of ribbon, and even rags, that 
the people would tie there, when there would be a 
Pattern at the Holy Well. And, besides, the girls 
had a great fashion of going there on Hallow Eve, 
to try old charms and “ pistrogues, ” “so that they 
might get to see whatever boy they were to 
marry. ” 

Well, this time, when Marg came in sight of the 
Well, wasn’t it all hid from her! ay and even the 
hollow where it lay was covered over with white 
columns of mist, that rose, and wavered, moving 
this way and that way as the night wind blew. It 
was steam from the Well, for the water there is 
warm. Not hot enough to make tea and boil 
eggs, as Mickey used to tell the people, but just 
nicely warm. And always in frost or cold, you 
could see the steam rising from it. 

But as long as Marg had been at the Furry 
Farm, she had never chanced to see it like that. 
The Well lay a piece off from where she had busi- 
ness. And Marg never had been one to go stra- 
vaguing the fields for pleasure; and she wasn’t 
going to begin that fashion now, and she married. 

Marg began to go slower, and to feel a bit fearful 


248 The Folk of Furry Farm 

in herself. It was Hallow Eve, when, as every- 
body knows, the dead can come back to visit 
those they love. And here was she, all alone 
among the wide, silent fields, close to the Holy 
Well, with the moonlight white upon everything. 
And not a sound, only the whisper, whisper, of the 
stream that ran from the Well; and the soft, white 
clouds of steam, dancing and beckoning like 
strange beings that had life, this way and that way 
across the water. . . . 

‘Til make no delay, for fraid I’d take fright 
altogether here!” she said to herself; and she 
hurried forward to the brink of the Well, and 
dipped in her can. 

What did she see, when she straightened herself 
up again, but a Face, at the other side of the Well, 
and it staring, staring at her. 

Her heart stopped beating; then “Patsy!” she 
said, in a choked kind of voice. . . . 

At the word, a puff of steam blew between her 
and the Face, and when she was able to see clearly 
again, it was gone! 

How Marg got home that night, she never knew. 
All of a tremble she was ; so much so, that her two 
shoes were full up with the water that kept spilling 
out of the can, she was walking so unsteadily. But 


An American Visitor 


249 


still she kept on as fast as she could, and never let 
go her hold of the water from the Holy Well, till she 
had it landed in upon the kitchen floor. And proud 
she was to find herself there ! and to be able to shut 
the door, between herself and the black shadows 
that seemed to rise out of the night, and to have 
been chasing and threatening upon her heels, once 
she left the Holy Well, all the way across the dark, 
lonesome fields. 

But what was worse on her was, that the old fret 
seemed to be wakening up in her heart; a sharp 
kind of pain, after all those years, at sight of the 
boy that had treated her so queerly. She couldn’t 
tell why! but there it was; and there’s others the 
same, that will always have a soft comer in their 
hearts for any one they were young with ; let alone 
that they’d have a wish for, as poor Marg had for 
Ratigan. 

And, “Was it Patsy that was in it?” she kept 
asking herself; “or could it be that it was only 
some Appearance for Death ... or a Visit . . . 
the Lord be between us and harm, I pray!” 

But now she was inside her own house, and it all 
seemed full of light that was very bright after the 
dark night outside. . . . There was a great look of 
comfort upon it. There were rows and rows of 


250 The Folk of Furry Farm 

good pewter plates and dishes and noggins, all 
shining and twinkling in the blazing firelight, she 
had them so well scoured and polished up. And 
the place was hung round with the fine sides of 
bacon that she had cured; hanks of yam she had 
spun, and stockings she had knitted, in the 
chimney-comer, above her spinning-wheel of black 
oak. And Mickey himself was sitting there, very 
much as she had left him, in his big chair, close 
to the turf-box, the way he had it convenient to 
throw on a few sods when they were needed to keep 
the big pot boiling. He had his specs upon his 
nose and his pipe ready filled, and the newspaper 
on his knee, reading in it now and again. Mar- 
garet never forgot to bring that to him, every 
week, from Melia’s shop. 

“ You’re later than I thought,” said Heffeman 
to her. 

‘'There’s what has me delayed,” said Margaret. 
“Kitty Grennan that bid me try the water from 
the Holy Well on that leg of yours ...” and she 
showed him what she had in the can. 

“And is that what you were at!” said Mickey, 
looking as proud as Punch; “getting the blessed 
water to beethe me leg. Well, sure, you can’t do 
worse than try it ! But I was getting really unaisy 


An American Visitor 


251 


in me mind, for fear of something having happened 
you . . . and a body feels a thing of the sort 
worse, if they’re helpless the way I am!” 

“The sorra ha’porth is wrong with me!” said 
Marg. 

And neither there was. And, of course, there 
was no occasion to tell HefTeman about what had 
happened at the Holy Well. What could she say? 
If it was an Appearance, well and good! there was 
no more to be said. But if it was Ratigan . . . ! 
and how could it be? How could he be there, 
trying to play off some trick on her? Wouldn’t 
it be best to say nothing? 

How could it be Patsy? wasn’t he married in 
America, ay, long enough before she was herself! 
And never had thought it worth his while to send 
her one line, either to ask for news of herself, or 
to tell her what he was doing with himself, out 
there. Just by chance, she had heard of his 
marriage. And, in troth, only for hearing that, 
she might be Marg Molally yet. You never can 
tell what small little word here or there will get 
you to do a certain thing or to leave it alone. 

Whatever came or went, then or at any other 
time, Marg never failed in anything that could be 
done for Mickey. She was very fearful about 


252 The Folk of Furry Farm 

going to the Well, after seeing what she saw there, 
that first night. And it should be done after dark, 
too; still, she persevered. 

“It must be continued on,” said Dark Moll, 
that had a good knowledge of such things, so that 
Marg thought well of consulting her, one day she 
met her on the road; “you must go on wid it. 
And the water must be got by one that has a wish 
for whoever has need of it; and that person must 
go by themselves ... if the Holy Well is to do any 
good, that is!” 

There wasn’t really one, on the face of this 
earth, to care one straw about poor Mickey, only 
his wife. And Marg . . . sure, it was more 
compassion than anything else she felt for him, 
seeing how old and lonely and helpless he was. 
Though, indeed, he was kind in his own way to her, 
and showed great confidence and respect for her 
and all she did, and she felt thankful to him, over 
and over, for that, and for the good home he put 
her over. That’s a thing that is generally a satis- 
faction to a woman, and it was to Margaret. 

But with others, Mickey Heffeman was no 
great favourite. He had no agreeable ways with 
him. He would do a kind turn for another, as 
soon as the next one; but then again he had a 


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253 


fashion of taking the good out of whatever he did 
that-a-way ; the same as the cow that fills the can, 
and then kicks it over. So it came about that 
there was no one to go for the water for his leg but 
Marg herself. She went to the Holy Well every 
evening of her life then. Sometimes it would be 
fairly early, just duskish, and sometimes it would 
be late enough before she would be ready to start 
off, but she never failed to go. 

This was the way with Marg, and as nothing 
strange occurred for some time, she was beginning 
to think that she had only imagined to see Ratigan 
that Hallow Eve at the Holy Well, when she got 
another great fright there. Bad as the first was, 
this was worse, so much so, that she nigh-hand fell 
out of her standing. 

She was making her way along by the Furry 
Hills, when suddenly there was the greatest stamp- 
ing and rustling and big clattering as if cart-loads of 
stones were being thrown down the side of the Fairy 
Cleft, and heavy sounds of grunting and breathing 
and snorting. And then she thought there was 
something like a figure of a man, going through the 
dusk, towards the Cleft, with a stick in his hand. 

Margaret stopped and tried to think what it 
could mean. 


254 


The Folk of Furry Farm 


‘ ‘It can’t be Dan Grennan!” she said to herself; 
“for what would he be doing here at this hour? 
God knows but it might be some villyans of 
tinkers. . . . But whatever it is, I’ll have to find 
out who is there, making so free, and coming in 
here upon our place!” 

So, though she was as frightened a woman as 
could be, she gave a great shout, thinking by that 
to frighten away whoever it might be. 

It did frighten the man that was there! her 
voice lifted him off his feet, he was so startled, the 
fields being generally so silent at that hour. 

He jumped up, and then he stopped; and the 
snorting and trampling feet stopped, too. Then 
the figure, that Marg could just make out against 
the pale yellow of the evening sky, where it was 
above the hill . . . the figure seemed to Marg 
to turn about, and then she could hear it coming, 
coming quickly down the hill towards her. 

She was frightened in earnest then. Her first 
thought was, that she’d run away. But her 
knees gave under her. So she crouched down 
close to the damp ground, thinking to escape 
being seen. And she had herself dead and buried, 
in her own mind that is, when the man came up, 
and stood still beside her. 


An American Visitor 


255 


“So you don’t know me, Marg Molally!” he 
said, in a very sad, mild voice; “you don’t remem- 
ber poor Patsy now! Nor couldn’t, I suppose! 
Mrs. Heffeman is too big and grand a person now, 
to have any recollection of the ould times!” 

And with that, he turned on the light of a lantern 
he was carrying under his coat; and Marg saw 
plainly who it was. 

“In the name of God, Patsy Ratigan, it’s not 
you!” she said. 

“Who else?” said he; “is it that I’m that 
changed a man, that you don’t know me? But 
small blame to me to be changed! after all the 
want and hardships I’m after putting over me! 
And small blame to you, either, not to know me. 
It’s another story with you,” he says, “the same 
as ever you look! not a day older than you were, 
the day you . . . well, sure, it’s bad to be raking 
up old sores! But if it was you that had been 
away, and came back . . . ! No matter what 
change there was upon you, I’d know your skin 
upon a bush, so I would!” 

Marg couldn’t but listen to him, for she was too 
much surprised to do anything else. Puzzled too 
she was. For she was thinking of the Face she 
had seen at the Well; and she had known that to 


256 The Folk of Furry Farm 

be Patsy Ratigan. And now here was a big, red- 
faced, puffy-looking man, saying that he was 
Ratigan ! 

God knows, there’s many a thing remains a 
puzzle! not to speak of what a body might chance 
upon, of a Hallow Eve. 

But she got no time then to think this out, for of 
all the romancing that ever was heard, and Rati- 
gan reeled it out of him then. 

4 ‘Little I thought, that when we’d meet, you 
would have forgotten me!” he said; “but sure 
enough, there’s the way . . . ! 

“ The full pig in the sty 
Thinks little of the empty one passing by! 

And I working and slaving off there in America, 
and never thinking when I came back, that I’d 
find meself forgot by every one, and you marrit!” 

“Marrit!” said Marg; “and what about your- 
self? and the widdah with her shop . . . and the 
six children?” 

“Widdah? What widdah?” said Ratigan; 
“who was it at all that put round that story upon 
me? I only wish I had him here!” says he, very 
courageous, “and I’d soon show him the differ! 
And you to believe that of me! I couldn’t have 


An American Visitor 


257 


believed it of you . . . only for seeing it now ! All 
I wonder is,” he went on, very bitter, “that it 
wasn’t ten widdahs! and sixty children that they 
had laid out for me! And I that was thinking of 
no one, only the girl at Ardenoo that I used to be 
helping of an evening with the bullocks . . . and 
of the welcome home she would have for me, 
whenever I’d come back!” 

Phwat! what he had in his mind was, that he 
had had enough of the hard work in America, and 
the hurry and noise there, once the widdah died, 
the crature. And her children took and threw 
Ratigan out of that; and it appeared then that 
they owned the shop and money, once the widdah 
was gone. And a loss it was to Patsy, that he 
hadn’t inquired fully into the thing before he got 
married. But when he had to quit out of the shop, 
where he had lived very nice and easy, and found 
he would have to earn for himself, he began to turn 
over in his mind about Ardenoo. Maybe Marg 
Molally was to the good still. And he knew her to 
be a good warrant to work. Moreover, he re- 
membered that Ardenoo was a pleasant place for 
being idle in ; and that’s what he liked best always. 

What he said further then to Marg was, that all 
he’d care to do now was, to have leave to rest 


17 


258 The Folk of Furry Farm 


himself awhile before going back again; and that 
he was trying the water of the Holy Well for a bad 
foot he had. But he had been advised to do the 
cure secretly, and that was how he chanced to be 
coming there so late to the Fairy Cleft. 

“But, ” says Ratigan, “I never said, to man nor 
mortal except yourself, who I am. You’re the 
only living soul in Ardenoo that I have any wish 
to speak to; and I’ll trust to you to say nothing!” 

“Very well!” said Marg, a bit puzzled why he 
should want nothing said. But, like many an- 
other, she was proud to be told what no one else 
knew. 

“And where do you stop?” said Marg then. 

“Bey ant in the town, ” said Ratigan, telling 
the truth for once; “Mrs. Melia that lets me sleep 
in the hay-loft that she has leaning up at the back 
of the house; and then it’s not so expensive on a 
poor man like Patsy. And, besides, I’d liefer not 
to be inside the shop; I can’t abide the least smell 
of drink!” 

Mrs. Melia could have told a different story 
about that, for the American, as he was called at 
the shop, was the talk of the whole place, the way 
he was going on with every play-boy that was 
there, treating them all. And she could get no 


An American Visitor 


259 


money out of him, only now and then. He 
would always be telling her, that he was expecting 
funds from his agent in America by the next mail. 

Well, that agent lived quite convenient to Ar- 
denoo! and was going about on four legs, as long 
as he would be let. There was no doubt that 
Ratigan had some way of getting money into his 
pocket; and also that cattle and other things were 
disappearing, no one knew how; neither did any 
one know whose turn it would be next. 

There is something very curious about cows 
and the things that will happen to them. Dark 
Moll had a story she was fond of relating, about 
Andy McGuinness, long ago, that saw a strange 
woman dressed in green, and long hair as yellow as 
butter flowing down her back, and she was milk- 
ing Andy’s fine cow one summer evening. So 
Andy caught the cow by the tail, when the woman 
disappeared at sight of him. And by that means 
he got inside the Furry Hills. And there was the 
fairy woman he had seen, and she with a fairy 
child in her arms. And Andy had to promise her 
that she might take a pint of milk every night for 
the child. And then he found himself out again 
with his cow safe in his own fields. And after 
that he had no more trouble with her. She 


260 The Folk of Furry Farm 

had been no use to him up to that, giving 
only small sups of milk, and no yield of butter 
upon even what she gave. 

Well, Moll said, now that all the cattle were 
disappearing, that it would be simple enough to 
find out all about them if only some one had the 
spirit to go to the Fairy Cleft like Andy, and see 
what was taking place there. She was right, too, 
as it happened, though not exactly in the way she 
meant. But no one had any wish to take that 
advice. 

“It’s easy for them to talk, that will do nothing 
themselves! advice is always cheap !” they would 
say. 

Ratigan, or the American, as the people called 
him, had a good deal to say about the stealing of 
the stock. 

“If it was away in the States that such a thing 
was going on,” he said, “the whole countryside 
would join, and turn out to hunt the cattle-thief! 
What good are the people here, anyway! Only 
for this bad foot of mine, I’d start the thing 
meself !” 

And with that he stuck out a foot as big as a bee- 
hive, to all appearance. And who was to know 
that there wasn’t a ha’porth the matter with the 


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261 


same foot? It was all play-acting he was, and 
by this talk he made it easy for himself to come 
and go after dark, in and out of the hay-loft at 
Melia’s. 

“Dan Grennan,” said Ratigan another time, 
“Dan that had a great deal to say over his glass 
last night about this business, and in particular 
about a bullock that is missing off the Furry Farm. 
Strayed, as likely as not ! But I can’t help think- 
ing of a saying I used to hear from an Irishman I 
met over in America; how that the fox always 
smells his own smell!” 

There were some that heard him say this that 
were inclined to be angry. It was no right thing 
to say of a decent neighbour. But the others 
laughed it off. The American had a way of 
making jokes, and no one minded much what he 
said, he being very free with his treats, too, to 
every one. 

All this time, poor Dan and Kitty were fretting 
their hearts out about the bullock that was lost. 
They knew well that Heffeman would blame them 
for the loss, and maybe bid them leave the place for 
some one that would be more careful. And then 
what would become of them and the little family? 
Marg did all she could, but the thing could not be 


262 The Folk of Furry Farm 

kept from Mickey’s knowledge for ever. He took 
it very hard. 

You would really think that it was worse for 
him to be at a loss than any one else that had met 
the same misfortune. And he with not one in his 
house to care about providing for, except himself 
and the wife! But God help him and all like him! 
Sure his money and money’s worth appeared to be 
all he had, at that time anyway, to care about; 
excepting only Marg herself, of course. And he 
was so well used by now to her, and all her care 
and attention, that he scarcely knew himself either 
how necessary she was to him, or how much he 
thought of her. 

But now, he wouldn’t listen to one word she’d 
say about this loss, to try to reconcile him to it; 
only he would keep on, ding-dong, from morning 
to night and from night to morning, lamenting 
about the fine beast that was gone, and saying 
that such a thing had never occurred as long as he 
had been to the good himself. At last, he began 
to say that he’d have to turn Dan and Kitty away. 

Now this is the kind of talk Marg had to listen 
to, all day long, up and down, this way and that 
way, the same thing over and over again, till she 
grew sick of the very name of a bullock! So you 


An American Visitor 263 

could hardly blame her, that she began to look 
forward to the evenings, when she would be 
slipping off to the Holy Well, and the chance of 
seeing Ratigan there and passing a few remarks 
with him. It happened pretty often that they 
met in this way. 

Ratigan still had the same pleasant manners 
with him, and the tongue that could coax the birds 
off the bushes. Sometimes he’d be telling Marg 
of all the troubles and hardships he met up with, 
out in America; and then again, it would be 
nothing but about the money you could earn and 
the fine times you could have there. And this 
would be, while he would be carrying the can of 
blessed water a piece of the way home for her. 
He never could abide, he’d cry, to see a woman 
have to work! as long as he’d have a leg under 
him ; and how that he himself was nearly cured by 
the same Well. Now Marg could not but be glad 
to have her mind diverted from poor Mickey 
with his complaints about the lost bullock as well 
as his lame leg. 

It was worse that Heffeman was growing over 
this matter as time went on, instead of beginning 
to forget it. In fact, it wasn’t Mickey alone, or 
even those only that had lost a beast themselves 


264 The Folk of Furry Farm 

that were uneasy, but all Ardenoo could do 
nothing but talk about the cattle being stolen, 
and wonder whose turn would come next. 

Now this thing is so simple that it's curious 
more don’t turn their hands to it. Horn brand or 
hide brand, they’re easily got rid of, with the help 
of a file and a pair of scissors. And if you start 
early in the night, you can travel a long way with 
whatever you may have to drive, before the weight 
of the people will be out of their beds. And if 
there chances to be a lonely spot like the Fairy 
Cleft anyway convenient, that crowns you for the 
job. The beasts could be taken there and along 
the disused boreen as handy as you like. Ratigan 
had it all as fit for his requirements as if he had 
made it himself. 

At last Heffeman made up his mind that he’d 
run no more risks about having his cattle stolen. 
So he said to Marg, “The fair in Clough-na-Rinka 
is coming on, and it would be as good for us to sell 
that half- score of store cattle there as to leave 
them to be stolen, like their comrade. They’ll 
sell at a loss,” he went on, with a sigh, “but sure, 
little fish is sweet! and the rent has to be made up. 
And it will only be worse to be keeping them back 
and having to fodder them in the winter, and 


An American Visitor 265 

the hay none too plenty . . . sure, they’d have 
themselves ett against next May!” 

“Whatever you say yourself,” said Marg, only 
too glad of the chance of getting rid of the bullocks, 
and thinking that then maybe Mickey would cease 
to be fretting and annoying himself over the one 
that was stolen; “but how will you manage to get 
to the fair?” 

“I know well that I’d have no right to go, and 
the leg the way it is with me,” said Mickey, “but 
I think you’d do, if you were instructed.” 

“ I’ll go, if you say the word, ” said Marg. 

She felt glad of the chance. She would hardly 
say it, even to herself, but she would like to get 
away for even that one day from poor Mickey. 
Not that she’d let any one say a word against him, 
but she was worn out of all comfort by his growling 
and complaining. Of course it was the bad leg 
that helped to make him so contrary; and Marg 
never forgot that, and would never make him an 
answer, no matter what he’d say. 

“I can go away easy enough with the mare and 
side-car . . .” for that is how Mickey himself 
always went to fairs. 

“Ora, what side-car do you want?” said Mickey 
a bit short ; for now along with all else, the poor old 


266 The Folk of Furry Farm 

man was fretting because he could not go to do the 
business himself, being sure, like every one, that 
he could do it better than any one else; “what side- 
car do you mean? Can’t ye take the little ass?” 

“She’s very slow now,” said Marg, “and it will 
leave me that I’ll have to be a long time away from 
you. ” 

“It’s lost for the want of work she is, this 
minute,” said Heffernan; “fresh enough she is, 
this minute, to dance a cat off the high-road! and 
as well, there’s a bit of ploughing that the mare 
could be at, here at home. ...” 

“I can walk; shanks’ mare will do me full as 
well as either ass or mare!” said Marg, that had 
not one ounce of lazy flesh upon her bones. 

So when the fair-day came round, she was up 
and off. bright and early, before the stars were out 
of the skies, the cattle having been sent on ahead 
with Dan Grennan. Marg had no delay in selling 
the stock, for fine beasts they were ; and to a dealer 
that she and Mickey were well acquainted with, so 
that Marg felt no great anxiety about the busi- 
ness. 

When they had the bargain closed, “Come along 
in here, Mrs. Heffernan, mam,” said this dealer, 
“to Mrs. Melia’s, a decent woman she is and keeps 


An American Visitor 


267 


a decent house as you may wish to find. And I can 
be paying you the money inside there, in the 
parlour, away out of the noise and crowds in the 
street,” said he, “let alone the mud and gutther, 
with the heavy rain that's falling. ...” 

“Very soft entirely it has turned, since the turn 
of the day, ” said Marg; “ the cloak on me is heavy 
with the soaking wet.” 

“You’re saying only the truth, mam,” said the 
dealer; “and all the more reason for you to be 
getting into shelter, where we can be having a cup 
of tea, or whatever other refreshment you like to 
put a name upon. ” 

“I thank you kindly,” said Marg; “indeed, 
I’ll be glad of something warm to drink. ...” 

Like many another woman, Marg had neglected 
herself in the matter of food, and had never tasted 
bite nor sup since leaving home that morning. 
And now that she had the selling of the cattle off 
her mind, she remembered that, and began to feel 
very weak-like in herself. 

So she raised no demur to going into Melia’s, 
and in particular because she had observed Rati- 
gan a piece off from her down the fair-green. He 
was pretending not to know her. Marg was no 
hand at that work, and she was glad not to have to 


268 The Folk of Furry Farm 

meet up with him, before all the neighbours. But 
Ratigan was keeping a close eye on her, all through. 
Not a turn of Marg that day but he watched. 
And when he saw herself and the dealer going into 
Melia’s, my dear, what did he do, only whipped 
round like shot, in and out among the crowds of 
people and beasts of all kinds, and up with him into 
the hay-loft. The big foot was no hindrance to 
him, he would explain, only betimes. And any- 
way, every one was too much taken up with their 
own concerns to mind much what the American 
was about that evening. 

The loft wasn’t to say very well built. There 
was a chink that he had often found very con- 
venient, for seeing what went on in Mrs. Melia’s 
parlour. He put his eye to it now. 

In due course, he saw all he wanted to see. 
There were Marg and the cattle-dealer, drinking 
their tea and eating fried eggs and bacon; and 
badly they both stood in need of their bit. Then 
the dealer pulled out the purse, and counted out 
the money upon the table, that he was paying for 
Mickey’s stock; and the luck-penny was handed 
back to him. Ratigan’s mouth was watering at 
the sight, and when he saw Marg tying up what 
she got, a full hundred pounds, in a strong bag, 


An American Visitor 269 

and fastening that into the front pocket of her 
cloak, inside, a very safe spot. 

“Yiz never got any account of the bullock that 
was lost . . . not to say, stole?*' says the dealer. 

“Never a word,” said Marg; “whoever done it, 
no one knows, nor can’t think. And to say that 
all over the whole of Ardenoo such work to be going 
on! Sure it’s a fright, so it is!” 

“You may say that; a fright it is, sure enough!” 
says the dealer; “but whoever it is, will soon be 
known ! I have that from certain knowledge ; and 
that the polis has all ready, and will have the thief 
inside of the barracks, before he’s a day oulder! so 
mind, now, I’m telling you!” 

“It would be a charity, too!” said Marg; and 
then the dealer bid her the time of day, and went 
off, to get the cattle home before it would be dark 
night down upon him and them, and it raining 
hard still. 

Marg was just thinking in herself, had she the 
money safe for Mickey, and fidgeting with her 
hand to feel was it where she had put it, not two 
minutes before, and she was thinking of the long 
road that lay between her and the Furry Farm, 
where she’d be as apt as not to meet with tinkers 
and queer people going along, after leaving the fair 


270 The Folk of Furry Farm 

and maybe they not so sober as they might be . . . 
when the door of the parlour opened, very easy, 
and in walked Ratigan. And not a limp was upon 
him then! He had too many other things in his 
head, to remember about his lame foot. But any- 
way, Marg was too much surprised to meet him 
there quite suddenly, after she trying to not see 
him all day, to remark on that. She was flustered, 
too, about the bag of money, not having satisfied 
herself yet that she had it in the safest place. 

She turned to face Ratigan, trying to look 
careless. But she felt trembly and queer, meeting 
him there, in that little crowded-up parlour. 
Some ways, it wasn’t the same thing at all as when 
they would be having just a chat in the dusk at the 
Holy Well, or straying along through the quiet 
fields. 

“ Good-evening, Mrs. Heffeman, mam,” said 
Ratigan, very polite; “I seen you over and over 
to-day ...” and he stopped short, and his eyes 
began looking at her every way. 

“Well, and if you did, and had anything to say, 
why didn’t you come up and speak to me?” said 
Marg hurriedly. 

It wasn’t what she wanted to say to him at all. 

“Och sure, how was I to know would you wish 


An American Visitor 


271 


that?” said Ratigan, very humble in himself; and 
then Margaret’s heart softened towards him. 

“You’re not going out in that dreep of rain?” 
says he, noticing that Marg was pulling up her 
cloak about her shoulders, where she had it 
undone, while she was drinking her cup of tea; 
“teeming out of the skies it is, as if all the wathers 
of the salt seas I have to cross was coming down 
upon Ardenoo!” 

“I’ll have to face out, rain or no rain,” said 
Marg ; “ I have a long ways before me ! ” 

“ I’ve a longer ! ” says he ; and he puffed a big sigh 
out of him; “and has to go wid meself. ...” 

“You should be used to that!” says Marg. 

He had her persuaded that he never was married 
at all. 

“I ought to be, I know,” said Ratigan; “but 
I haven’t the short memory I see with some 
people for the old times! But them that’s in 
heaven themselves, finds it easy to forget all else; 
and thim that’s snug and warm in their own home, 
has little thought for them that has to be without 
in cold and wet and hardship!” 

“There’s more a body wants than food and 
fire,” says Marg, as if she was thinking out loud. 

“Ay is there! that’s a true word!” said Ratigan. 


272 The Folk of Furry Farm 

He was thinking at that present, that he wanted 
the price of his passage back to America, as badly 
as ever a man wanted anything! He had squan- 
dered away the money he had got for the cattle he 
had stolen, in paying Mrs. Melia some of what he 
owed her, and the rest drinking and spreeing. And 
now he was after hearing through the chink in the 
hay-loft all that the dealer had been saying to 
Marg. He knew about the money she had been 
putting away; and he knew, too, about the polis, 
and the danger he was in. And he felt that the 
sooner he could quit out of that the better it would 
be for his health. 

But how was he going to get away, and he 
without a penny to his name! And it would take 
some days for him to get any more by that means 
he was employing. And he must lose no time. 

The only thing to be done was, to get a hold of 
that bag of money he had seen with Marg. Have 
it he must, by hook or by crook! Maybe she’d go 
with him. That would be the simplest, though 
not what he’d like best. But he spoke to her very 
nice and soft, saying how he thought the world 
and all of her, and trying to get to coax her. . . . 

“I must be shortening the road home!” was all 
Marg said in answer. And she went over to the 


An American Visitor 


273 


window, and stood there, looking out at where the 
rain was coming down in white sheets of wet, and 
running down the street in streams, all choked up 
with mud, after the traffic of the day, and the 
trampling feet of the sheep and cattle. It wasn’t 
very tempting; and she turned away from it, as if 
she couldn’t make up her mind ought she to go, or 
to wait a while longer. 

Ratigan all the time was watching her, like a cat 
with a mouse. 

“ Maybe it would be as good for you to start off 
at once!” he said; “it’s not better it will be get- 
ting . . . only the dark night coming down. ...” 

He was mad to be off, knowing it wouldn’t an- 
swer for him to be delaying there, so close to the 
barracks, and even wondering how soon he’d have 
to make a run for it, money or no money. But if 
only he could get Marg outside the town, and on a 
lonely piece of the road, how simply he could be 
coming along behind her in the dark, and take the 
bag from her; and she never to know who he was. 
Or if she did itself, what loss ! A man like Ratigan 
can’t be too particular. 

“No, it’s not better it will be getting!” he said 
again. . . . “Sure, if only I dar’ go with ye, to see 
you safe . . . but that mightn’t answer ; . .” 

18 


274 The Folk of Furry Farm 

“The Lord save us!” says Marg, interrupting 
him there. “That’s Mickey! I thought to know 
the rattling sound of the side-car; it never can go 
by annonst. . . 

Sure enough, there it was, coming up the street, 
and Heffeman sitting balanced upon it, looking 
little and bent and perished-looking, with the dint 
of the wind and wet, in spite of the big frieze coat 
he had on, with the collar shaving his ears, and his 
hands lost in the length of the sleeves. 

“Holy Mother of God!” said Marg, “sure it’s 
not down he’s wanting to get, there, in that 
thronged place! He’ll be kilt dead! Wait, wait a 
minute, Mickey!” she said, as if he could hear her 
through the window, “wait! there’s no one can 
humour that poor leg only meself, when he does be 
getting down off the car ...” and in her hurry 
to save Mickey, she threw off the heavy cloak and 
left it, money and all, down upon the floor, and 
ran out, through the heavy polters of rain, over to 
Mickey upon the car. 

“You’ll mind that for me!” she called out over 
her shoulder to Ratigan, as she darted out of the 
door. 

Mind it! Little delay Ratigan made, only 
whipped the bag of money out of where Marg had 


An American Visitor 


275 


it inside the cloak, and away with him, like a 
redshank, by the back door. 

“What at all brought you here, at this late 
hour?” said Marg, reaching up her hand to help 
Mickey off the side-car. 

“Well, when I saw the evening turning so wild 
and hard,” said Mickey, “I thought bad of you 
having that long walk home, after such an early 
start this morning. And along with all, I had a 
bad dream and I sitting in the chimney-corner. 
I thought to see you in some great danger . . . 
and it was about the money you were after getting 
for the bullocks. ... So Dan was back, and he 
gave me an account of all, and the good price 
they made. . . . And I got him to throw the 
harness on the old mare ... it was too bad a day 
for she to go plough. ... I would have been here 
long ago, if I’d been able to get ready meself. . . . 
But hurry now, girl dear! you’re getting all wet 
. . . and no cloak about you. ...” 

“Sure, what matter! And I dreading the long 
walk home in the dark!” said Marg, nearly ready 
to cry when she thought of the poor old lame chap 
quitting his snug seat at home, to come look for 
her, at the very time that she was listening to 
Ratigan with his foolish wild talk. 


276 The Folk of Furry Farm 


“I’ll just run back for the cloak,” said Marg, 
“and then there need be no more delay upon us, 
only to get home in comfort!” 

Well, there’s where it was, when she went back, 
and took up the cloak, and just put her hand 
inside, to make sure she had the money, and it 
wasn’t there! She nigh-hand fainted, with the 
fright. She couldn’t believe it! She felt in all 
her pockets, over and over again. She called out 
for Mrs. Melia, who came and helped her to look 
everywhere about the room, and out in the wet 
street, over to where Mickey was waiting on the 
side-car, and telling Marg to make haste and come 
on out of that. 

“What will you do, at all at all?” said Mrs. 
Melia . . . “will you be able to pacify Mickey? 
. . . tell him . . . what would you say? that you 
left it here with me, and I having it locked up and 
had to go away. ...” 

Mrs. Melia made that up out of the goodness of 
her heart, but Marg wouldn’t agree. 

“I can only say what happened,” she said. 

She did that; and Heffeman looked terribly put 
about. But he took it the best ever you knew. 
Far worse Marg herself was. 

“We’ll go at once and notice the polis!” he 


An American Visitor 277 

said; “sure whoever took the money can’t be 
far!” 

So they did that; but they scarcely had their 
story told, when in walked two constables, and 
Ratigan between them. 

It was all up with him then ! the butter came out 
of the stir-about in earnest. The whole thing was 
opened up and explained. Great excitement 
there was over it, and a trial of law, that you can 
hear talked about still in Ardenoo. 

What never was rightly known was, who told 
the polis. Some laid it on Dark Moll, but others 
would not believe she’d do such a dirty mean turn. 
Still, she had a spleen in for Ratigan, because he 
never gave her so much as the price of a drink 
of porter; penny wise and pound foolish as the 
saying is. 


CHAPTER VIII 


ROSY AT FURRY FARM 

Kitty Grennan was just after starting the child- 
ren off for school, of a dark, rainy morning, coming 
up to the Christmas. She was ready ing-over the 
house, stooping to make down a fire for the pig’s 
pot, when she heard a quick, heavy step outside, 
and in comes Dan, very hurried. 

“Musha then, Dan,” said Kitty, a bit short, 
4 ‘what brings you back here so soon?” 

She was feeling that she had a lot to get through, 
and that she could do it better if there was no one 
in the place only herself. 

“Sure, I thought,” she went on, “that if I seen 
you here by dinner-time, it would be the soonest I 
need expect, after all you told me last night had to 
be done, below there at that gap, to keep the cattle 
from breaking out of their own fields. . . . But 
Dan, agra! is there anything the matter with ye? 
You look pale-looking, someways ... as if you 
278 


279 


Rosy at Furry Farm 

were after seeing something not right ... a ghost 
or . . . Gashly white you are indeed, God help 
ye!” 

“The sorra ha’porth is wrong with me!” said 
Dan, “but as for what I seen . . . ! troth, it may 
be a ghost, or it may not! But the appearance 
there was upon it was of little Rosy Rafferty, that 
marrit Art Heffeman . . . and we heard last week 
was after burying him, God rest his sowl! sup- 
posing it’s true that he’s gone. ...” 

“And is it true?” 

“Och, so she says, and that poor Art was only 
lying a short time, though out of his health for long 
enough . . . but I must be off now ...” 

“Stop a minute, Dan! What brings her here 
now?” 

“Wirra, if I know! going back home to the poor 
old mother, she says. And now, will ye lave the 
way, and let me out on the door?” 

Kitty was standing between him and it. 

“To the mother! And is it that Rosy doesn’t 
know?” 

“The sorra word she knows!” 

“And you didn’t let on to her about it?” 

“No! nor wouldn’t, for a pound-note. Let me 
get out of this place, woman dear, I tell ye. She’ll 


280 The Folk of Furry Farm 

be here in no time, and I’ll not stop to be seeing 
her . . 

“Ora, Dan, acushla, won’t you wait even till 
I’ll make her sensible of what’s after happen- 
ing .. . ?” 

“I’ll not! Where’s the use? It’s woman’s 
work, so it is! Let me go! Sure, haven’t I to be 
off about me business!” 

And with that, Dan made a bolt through the 
door, and was out of sight, before you could look 
about you. 

“What will I do at all at all?” said Kitty to 
herself, trembling and watching the door. 

She hadn’t long to wait, fortunately, for that 
would only have made her more cowardly . . . 
when up comes Rosy, and she with a young child 
in her arms. As thin as a rake, Rosy was, and her 
face as white as the snow. 

“Och, Rosy, and is it yourself that’s in it!” 
said Kitty, speaking very fast; “come in here, 
ahagur , and sit down by the fire ! Here, let me take 
the child from you ; you must be tired ! Sure, they 
say a hen is heavy if you carry it far enough, let 
alone a babby the size of this of yours, the Lord 
love her, I pray!” 

Kitty talked like that, because she was so upset 


Rosy at Furry Farm 


281 


and confused. The baby was no size, scarcely. 
But it’s never too easy to know what to say to them 
that are in trouble. So it was the last word she 
wanted that Kitty could lay her tongue to then. 

Rosy just sat down, and let Kitty take the child 
from her. And her two hands dropped into her 
lap, and she sat there, with the big, hollow eyes of 
her looking, looking all around, as if she was 
expecting to find there something she had lost; 
and every minute giving a bit of a cough, very low 
down and weak-sounding, as if that was all she 
was able to do. Her hands were burning hot, 
but she shivered now and then, and the wet from 
her clothes began rising in steam, with the heat of 
the fire, for Kitty had her by the hearth. 

‘‘Well, and how are ye yourself? ” Kitty went on, 
‘ * and this little one is cold, the cratyureen ! I must 
get her a sup of warm milk. She’s about the one 
size with our own babby here, that’s asleep above 
in the room. ...” 

“Ay, poor little Bride, that is,” said Rosy; 
“she’s all I have now, since I lost poor Art. ...” 

“We heard about that, but only a bare sketch of 
it, and couldn’t rightly believe it,” said Kitty; 
“God help us all! the fine boy that he was! And 
was he long sick, the poor fellah?” 


282 The Folk of Furry Farm 


“Ay! long enough for he to be tired of his bed, 
and of seeing me put about for the want of his 
wages. That was what had him worse! It was a 
chill he took, from a wetting he got, one night that 
one of the other van-drivers was too drunk to look 
after his own horse, when they got back to the 
stables. So Art did this man’s work, when he had 
his own done, the way he wouldn’t maybe lose his 
job, let alone the poor horse, that couldn’t be left 
without his feed and rub-down. That left Art 
very late getting home. And you couldn’t 
warm him. Pains in the bones he took. There 
was nothing I heard of but I tried with him. But 
all was of no avail!” 

“Glory be to God! to think he took his death so 
simple!” 

“Ay and suffered terrible,” said Rosy, still 
looking all round the kitchen, and talking quite 
hard and unconcerned you’d think; “and until 
then, we had great confort! He was earning fine 
pay at that job. But it’s not long the purse will 
last, when there’s nothing coming in, and a great 
deal going out, for medicine and doctors and 
nourishment. . . . But what I thought terrible 
bad of, was not being able to get down here to see 
me poor mother! not for a long time. I managed 


283 


Rosy at Furry Farm 

to send her a few little things, to put her over 
the Hollintide; but sure well I know, she'd have 
given all the tea and sugar that ever came out of 
Dublin, for the one sight of me!” 

“Ay, so she would!” said Kitty; “but she 
wasn't too badly off for company then ... we 
went over to see her. ...” 

“Well, and how did she appear then?” 

“The best!” said Kitty; “Dark Moll was 
stopping with her at that time, in the nights, any- 
way. And your mother was looking very comfort- 
able and all done out very nice; and the house the 
same.” 

Kitty saw no occasion for telling Rosy that it 
was in bed the Widdah Rafferty was that day, and 
scarcely able to turn herself round; and her poor 
eyes strained crooked in her head, watching the 
door, for Rosy and Art, that she was expecting 
down from town. And it was Kitty herself that 
had swept over the place, and had settled up the 
old woman with a white handkerchief about her 
neck, and a clean cap from under the bed, where 
she was saving it up for Rosy to see on her, the way 
she would be someway decent-looking then. 

“I'm glad to get that account of her,” said 
Rosy; “many’s the time me and Art spoke over 


284 The Folk of Furry Farm 

her, and how we could not prevail with her to come 
to us. We had her once, but she couldn’t content 
herself in Dublin. Cart-ropes wouldn’t hold her; 
only grousing to get back to her own little house; 
lonesome, she said, she felt, for the dresser with the 
bits of chaneys of cups and jugs that she was 
looking at all her life; and sure, the weight of them 
were no good! only cracked so that they wouldn’t 
hold anything!” 

“Sure it’s just whatever a body is used to!” 
said Kitty; “I chanced to be going past her house, 
the day she got back to it. You’d wonder, to see 
how proud she was, when she picked the key of the 
door out from under the furze-bush, where she 
had hid it, when she went away. ...” 

“Just two months was all she stopped with 
us, ” said Rosy. 

“A bit puzzled she was, at first, to open the 
door,” said Kitty, “because the grass and weeds 
had all grown up round about the furze-bush, and 
it was a good while before we could get the key. 
But it was there, just as she had left it, for Heffer- 
nan never went next nor near the place although it 
is on his land. But it appeared as if he knew 
nothing about her going, or coming back either. 

“So we opened the door that was stiff, and the 


285 


Rosy at Furry Farm 

key rusty and had to be humoured. And there, 
when we got in, everything was just as she had left 
it, even to a few sods of turf piled against the 
wall. And in that way, we had no delay in lighting 
a bit of fire. I stopped awhile with her, and got 
her in a sup of spring water. And she had plenty 
of little vittles, that she said you had sent with 
her. 

“Ay, ’twas little she’d take from me . . . and 
never could get to know why she wouldn’t stop 
altogether!” said Rosy again, very pitiful, as if she 
couldn’t but keep thinking of that. 

“I never could find out rightly, what fault she 
had to being in Dublin,” said Kitty; “but for one 
thing, says she to me, ‘It’s a fright, so it is, the way 
they do be going along with the funerals in Dublin ! 
the horses trotting their living best, as if it was a 
hurry the people were in, to get shut of whoever 
was dead, and have them out of their sight, once 
the breath of life leaves the body! They appear 
to have no nature in them at all, there bey ant in 
the Big Smoke,’ she says, ‘so much so that I’d 
far liefer to be at home in me own little place 
here,’ she says, ‘with the little things and the ways 
that I was always used to,’ she says.” 

“ Whethen now, she needn’t have minded that!” 


286 The Folk of Furry Farm 

said Rosy; “we could have brought up any of her 
own little curey-careys that she had any wish for 
. . . and as for funerals! the Lord knows how 
she got such a notion as that! Sure wouldn't 
we have brought her back to Ardenoo, and buried 
her in the old graveyard of Clough-na-Rinka, 
where all the family does be buried? Poor Art! 
his people all belong to Dublin and it was with 
them I laid him. But we’d have brought her back 
here, and laid her alongside me poor father. She 
that was particular about his funeral ! She made 
him be carried the longest way round, and she went 
to the greatest trouble ever you knew, for fear 
they’d be opening the grave for him of a Tuesday. ” 

“ I often heard that it was no right thing to do, 9 9 
said Kitty. Neither it is. 

“He was worthy of it all, whatever!” said Rosy, 
letting herself go back on the old days when she 
had both father and mother with her; “dear! the 
kind father he was to me! ‘Look at your long 
scur sheen of a daughter!’ me mother would cry 
to him betimes, ‘off there she is, idling and playing 
football with the boys! she has a right to be 
checked ! ’ and all the answer me father would make 
was, * Let her alone ! the world will well lam her ! 
she’ll have her own share of trouble, time enough!' 


Rosy at Furry Farm 287 

And sure, so I had!” said Rosy, and with that 
word, she began to cry. 

“Ora, God comfort ye!” said Kitty, crying 
herself then. And she laid the child down out of 
her arms, and went to compassionate Rosy. 

But Rosy stood up, and flung away from her, 
and then threw herself down upon the settle, and 
“Let me alone!” she said, “until I cry me fill!” 

“Do that, God help ye!” said Kitty; “sure it 
will only ease your heart; only not to be fretting 
too much. . . .” 

“And why wouldn’t I fret for Art, and cry him 
too, and he the best man to me that ever stood in 
shoes! No matter what notion I took, even the 
time I got the feathery hat with his week’s wages, 
he never as much as said to me, ‘111 you done it, 
Rosy!”’ 

And Kitty thought to let her have her cry out, 
and that she would say nothing more to stop her. 
But Rosy lifted herself up again at that word about 
Art, and said she, “What at all am I doing spend- 
ing me time here, instead of going off home at 
once? Sure won’t me mother be as bad as meself, 
very nigh-hand, about Art, that she often said was 
the same as a son to her?” 

And she was making for the door, when Kitty 


288 The Folk of Furry Farm 

said, “Rosy, acushla, won’t you stop a bit longer, 
till the weight of the rain is over? And I’m just 
about hanging down the kettle, to wet a cup of tea. 
It will put some heart into ye. Sure it will only 
have your mother worse, if you were to go in and 
you so poor-looking in the face. Fretting she’ll be, 
then; and you with a cold upon you!” 

Rosy was after giving a few little coughs out of 
her again. 

“I’ll wait for no tea here!” said Rosy; “can’t 
I get all I want, at home with her?” 

“ Don’t be asking to go there, Rosy ! ” said Kitty. 
And there she stopped; and of all the white, 
frightened faces that ever was seen, Rosy’s was 
the worst. 

“Why? is she dead too?” says she, as calm and 
quiet as if she was just asking, “Is she gone to 
the chapel?” 

“Och no! not at all! Dead? Why, what put 
that foolishness into your head? But . . . well, 
you see, she wasn’t to say too well at all this 
length of time. ...” 

“Sure that’s no news!” said Rosy; “out of her 
health she has been for long enough. And isn’t 
that all the more reason for I to be with her, that 
knows all her little ways . . . ?” 


289 


Rosy at Furry Farm 

“Very weakly entirely in herself she was, 
latterly, ” said Kitty, “and I could see no improve- 
ments in her, and . . . and had no great com- 
fort. 

“I used to be dreaming a power about her!” 
said Rosy. 

“And it’s a long step, up that boreen, where 
your little place is, and I wasn’t so well able to go 
look after your mother, ” said Kitty, “when this last 
baby came ; a real little shaan she is, very little and 
donny in herself, and very contrary and cross, would 
do nothing only bawl at first, so that I mightn’t lay 
her out of me arms, day or night . . . and ...” 

Kitty stopped a minute, not knowing what she 
ought to say next. 

“Well?” says Rosy, with the two burning eyes 
of her fastened on Kitty’s face. 

“Well, sure, Dan used to give her a look-in, as 
often as he could. And he brought me word how 
that Mrs. Rafferty said she wasn’t too lonesome at 
all. And that Moll Reilly was the best of com- 
pany to her, bringing her all the news of the whole 
country ; and real useful and handy, in spite of her 
having no use of her eyes; would get a few sprigs 
for the fire or a sup of water from the well, as 
handy as any one else . . . and ...” 


19 


290 The Folk of Furry Farm 

Kitty stopped again here. It was much like a 
baulking horse being brought up to a jump and 
slipping off to one side or the other, every time you 
get close to it. 

“She’ll not want Moll any more now!” said 
Rosy. 

“No, indeed she’ll not!” said Kitty. 

Of course, what she was thinking was, that 
where Mrs. Rafferty was at that present, she’d 
have no need of thinking about the fire or water 
either, only wait and take what she’d get, one of 
a crowd of other old women . . . “And so, as I 
was saying, I went up to the boreen to see your 
mother, as soon as ever I could get to put the 
baby down and leave her . . . and do you know, 
Rosy, it was the poor way I found your mother 
in!” 

Kitty was beginning to think that it might be as 
good for her to say something like that, so that 
Rosy might be got to understand how things were, 
and that her mother was better away from the old 
home. 

“Lying in the bed she was,” said Kitty, “and 
not able to sit up or move herself ; and the fire gone 
black out . . . and no little refreshment within 
her reach, only a bucket of cold water, that she 


291 


Rosy at Furry Farm 

could be taking little sups out of, till Moll would 
be back at dark. But still, she was contented 
enough, and said it was what Moll was real good 
to her; and would share with her whatever little 
things she’d have gathered up through the neigh- 
bours on her rounds; a grain of tea or a bit of 
butter or maybe a cut of bacon ; whatever it might 
be she’d ...” 

“She’ll not need to be depending out of Moll 
and her old pucks of bags any longer!” said Rosy, 
a bit proud in herself. 

The Raffertys were a most respectable family 
always. Poor they might be, and were, too; but 
they never said anything about that, or would 
make a poor mouth, only strive to put the best 
foot foremost among the neighbours. “And I’ll 
not forget it,” Rosy went on, “to poor Moll, nor 
let her be the worse of any little attention or kind- 
ness that she showed to me mother, all this time!” 

God help her! and only He knew what poor 
Rosy had in her mind then, or what way she 
thought she would have of rewarding Moll! But 
Rosy never thought much. If she did, it wouldn’t 
have been the big surprise to her that it was, to 
hear all Kitty had to tell her, in the end, about 
the poor old mother. 


292 The Folk of Furry Farm 


Rosy stood up, and was making to go out, when 
Kitty said, “Arrah, won’t you wait awhile with 
me?” 

“It’s too long I’ve been already, delaying!” 

“But sure, listen ... !” and then Kitty 
stopped. 

“Well?” said Rosy, half impatient. 

“She’s . . . she’s not there . . . !” 

“What’s that you’re after saying to me? that 
me mother’s not in it?” 

“Ora, Rosy alanna , don’t take it too hard! 
but you see, it was only worse she was getting, and 
a week ago we sent for the doctor. And he said 
it was no way for she to be left there with no one 
all day, only herself ; that it was the best of care she 
needed . . . and she with no use of herself, nor 
couldn’t even turn in the bed. And who was 
there, to mind her? I could only go an odd 
time . . . and so . . . and so . . . they sent the 
sick-car and she was took off to the Union . . . 
and ...” 

Kitty had to stop at that, for she and Dan had 
gone to help to lift the poor weakly old woman 
from her bed into the sick-car, and she remembered 
the white face of her, and the way she was shaken 
and rattled from side to side, as they drove off with 


2 93 


Rosy at Furry Farm 

her, and Dan locked the door, after they quenching 
the bit of fire upon the hearth. . . . 

“To the Union! Och, Mother! the Work- 
house . . . !” 

There’s all that Rosy said. 

“She’ll be well minded there, Rosy ... by 
what they say!” said Kitty, crying down big tears. 

But Rosy appeared to hear nothing, only that 
one word, “The Union!” and she jumped up, and 
off with her out of the door, and down the boreen, 
flying through the pours of rain. 

“The Lord help us now!” said Kitty; “what at 
all will I do? And the child wakening up to cry!” 

She ran to the cradle, and whipped up the poor 
little strange baby to comfort it; and then back 
with her to the door. Dan was just slingeing into 
sight, from the back of the turf-clamp. 

“What came over you to stay away like that?” 
said Kitty to him; “and there she’s gone racing off, 
once she heard about the mother being took off . . . 
and it raining buckets down out of the skies upon 
her . . . and she wid a cough. ...” 

“Why did you let her go?” 

“If you had stopped in, as I asked you, you’d 
know why!” said Kitty; “but it’s to the Union 
she’s making now. . . . What ails you, to be 


294 The Folk of Furry Farm 

standing there talking, instead of going after 
her?” 

“And what will I do, when I do catch her?” 
said Dan, very meek and humble. 

“What is there to do, only go with her? Isn’t 
the little ass yoked there, that you had out with 
fodder to the bullocks this morning? God be 
with the day the same ass fell lame, and had to be 
kept at Heffeman’s. . . . Marg that was coming 
back from the fair with her. . . . But do you be 
off now . . . here, take the ould umbrell’ with you, 
and . . . and see here ! the quilt from the bed will 
help to keep some of the wet off her . . . and let 
you throw a sack about your own shoulders. ...” 

Dan did all that, and started the old donkey off 
as well as he could. Short and sweet like an ass’s 
gallop, as the saying is, and she soon failed at it, 
but he was able to overtake Rosy. And as soon 
as Kitty, that was watching from the door, saw 
that he had got her settled into the cart, she went 
back to Rosy’s baby, and began to cry. 

“And the others all gone from her! Dublin 
must be a hard place to rear a child. To think 
this is the only one she has left, God comfort her!” 

But it wasn’t long Kitty could spend lamenting 
like that. She had too much to do, what with 


2 95 


Rosy at Furry Farm 

minding the two babies, and warming and feeding 
the other children, coming in wet and perished 
from school. So she didn’t feel till it was dark 
night down upon her. And then she began to 
think there must be something wrong, Dan was so 
long about getting back. And she felt uneasy, 
the night was so hard. It seemed as if the rain 
was never to stop. 

Once she had the children all in bed and asleep, 
there wasn’t a sound to be heard, only the dreep, 
dreep of the wet from the thatch, and the crying 
of the wind in the chimney. She was sitting 
by the hearth, rocking the cradle. Every minute 
was like an hour. Kitty would look up at the old 
clock, and think something must have stopped it, 
the hands were moving round so slowly. 

Suddenly, at long last, the door opened, and in 
staggered Dan. Kitty jumped up with her heart 
in her mouth ; she was so spent with the long loneli- 
ness and the watching, that even to see him, 
though she had been expecting no one else, gave 
her a great start. 

“Musha, Dan, what’s *on’ ye at all?” she said, 
taking him by the hand; for he was so unsteady 
on his legs that she began to think he had drink 
taken, though it was seldom Dan took a sup at all. 


296 The Folk of Furry Farm 


He never made her an answer, only let her put 
him sitting in front of the fire, and there he re- 
mained and not a word out of his head ; and the wet 
steaming out of his clothes and he white with cold 
and pure misery. Kitty was frightened when she 
got a good look at him. But she said nothing, 
only gave him some hot tea, and when he had that 
taken, and his wet brogues were pulled off, “Thank 
God!” he said, “that I’m safe back again!” 

“Ay, agra, ” said Kitty; “but where did you 
leave poor Rosy? I never thought she’d stop 
away from the child, above all. . . . ” 

“Stop away? ay, and that’s what she’s apt to 
do!” 

“Ora, Dan, what’s this you’re saying?” 

And Kitty began to cry again. 

The life was coming back to Dan and the colour 
to his face, and said he, “I’ll tell ye now! no, poor 
Rosy you’ll never see again. . . . She’ll scarce 
pass the night, the Lord have mercy on her 
soul!” 

“Oh, Dan! is it the truth you’re telling me?” 

“It is, it is, God’s truth! You spoke of me 
looking as if I was after seeing a ghost, when I 
came in here this morning, to warn you that she 
was coming. Well, when I was going along with 


297 


Rosy at Furry Farm 

her in the cart to the Union, the heart would die 
in me betimes, the way she’d be going on. . . . ” 

“What way?” 

“Och, laughing mostly, and talking to herself. 
‘Poor Art!’ she’d cry; ‘the day he near cut the 
thumb off himself, instead of one of the seed 
potatoes ! ’ and then about some pickther they got 
from Tommy the Crab . . . and something about 
Wild Geese . . . romancing she must have been. 
I could not know the half of what she was saying. 

“Well, when we got to the Union, we were both 
as wet as if we were after being ducked in the sea. 
I lifted Rosy down out of the cart, and by good 
luck we were just in time to get in. They were 
about shutting the gates. 

“But in any case, they would have been hard- 
set to keep Rosy out! She just ran straight on, 
and not a word out of her! I managed to get a 
hold of her arm, and kept her in a bit, till I knew 
what way we ought to go through that big awful 
place. I asked here and I asked there, and at last 
we were put in charge of a young slip of a . . . 
ward-maid, they called her. And she got orders 
to bring us to a certain ward, and we’d find Mrs. 
Rafferty there. 

“Of all the cold, bare places . . . the long 


298 The Folk of Furry Farm 

passages and the white walls and stone floors . . . 
it would give you the shivers, only to look about 
you there! 

“At last we got to the ward, and you'd wonder 
where all the old women came from, to fill it! It 
was as big as the chapel beyant . . . but as 
large as it was, it was small enough for all it had to 
hold. You could scarcely drop a pin between 
the beds. And some of the women were asleep 
and a few lay there middling quiet. But the 
weight of them were sitting up, talking and laugh- 
ing, or fighting with one another; and a few were 
crying to themselves. And most of them had little 
weeny tin boxes in their hands that they held out, 
begging you for a pinch of snuff. You’d have to 
pity them, they were so anxious for it ! 

“We were brought to a bed at the far end of the 
room. 

“‘There’s Mrs. Rafferty!’ said the ward-maid. 

“Rosy stooped down. 

“‘Mother!’ says she; and then she gave a start. 

“‘That’s not her at all!’ said Rosy. 

“‘Are ye sure? Look again!’ said the ward- 
maid, quite unconcerned. 

“Rosy put her hand on my arm; it was like a 
live coal. 


299 


Rosy at Furry Farm 

“‘Take me away!’ says she. 

“We went through three rooms more, like that. 
RafTertys seemed as thick as blackberries there. 
At every step, Rosy’s hand got heavier and her 
face wilder. 

“‘There’s only the one more,’ says the girl, 
‘in that bed . . .’ and she pointed to a comer 
where there was a screen up ; ‘ troth, I believe yous 
are late! Ay, the bed’s empty; she must have 
died since I was round this morning . . . sure I 
could have told yous. . . .’ 

“‘I don’t believe a word of what you’re say- 
ing ! ’ says Rosy ; and her face was like scarlet now. 

“‘Plaze yourselves!’ says the girl very impu- 
dent and hardened. 

“But on the minute, up came a nun; she looked 
very nice and kind. But what could she do ! only 
bring us to make sure, where the dead does be put 
. . . and I won’t spake of that! But Rosy just 
saw that it was her very mother that was lying 
there ... no more respect for her than if it was 
a dumb brute mother-naked . . . and so Rosy 
gave one little sigh out of her, and sank away down 
from me, on to the cold, hard floor. . . . 

“ In a dead faint she was. They got the doctor, 
to see if he could bring her to. 


300 The Folk of Furry Farm 

“ ‘ Sir/ says I, ‘is there much a trouble to her?’ 

“‘There is, indeed,’ he says, ‘but there won’t 
be long!’ and then he said something about her 
lungs having been in a bad way for some time past ; 
and now getting this chill, and the shock and all. 
There was little could be done for Rosy; all the 
doctors in Dublin wouldn’t save her. 

“‘She’ll scarce pass the night,’ he said; and 
went off, for he appeared to be very busy, and 
tired-looking he was, too. The mm and a couple 
more carried off poor Rosy, and I waited about, 
thinking to get to see the nun again. And so I 
did, after a long time. And she said I might go 
home, for I could do no more there. 

“‘You can’t see the poor young woman again,’ 
says she; ‘but it makes no differ, for she knows 
no one; and I’ll see she gets proper care.’ 

“‘Oh sure I know that, mam,’ says I; ‘but if 
only she could have seen the poor mother, just the 
once . . . !’ 

“So she questioned me a bit, up and down; 
and I related the whole thing to her, and said, I 
thought very bad of leaving Rosy that was a neigh- 
bour and so well acquainted with us both, there 
by herself, if death was coming upon her; and 
says the nun, ‘ I give you my word again, she 


30i 


Rosy at Furry Farm 

wouldn’t know you; she’s not aware of anything 
now, she’s so far through! But I’ll promise you 
that I’ll look after her, so long as the breath is in 
her, and I’ll see that everything possible is done 
for her; and let you get off back home . . . you’re 
wet and tired. . . .’ 

“So she moved off, and I got the little ass . . . 
she was no good to go at all, by reason of the rain, 
that had her powerless . . . but she’s like all 
asses in that! But that’s what has me so late. 
And now we’ll go to bed; I’ll have to be up at cock- 
crow in the morning. ...” 

“For what?” says Kitty, “and you so tired!” 

“That’s what I am, too; as betten as the road. 
But I must give word at Heffeman’s of what’s 
after taking place!” 

“Them two babbies is sleeping very peaceable, ” 
says Kitty, taking a last look at her own and 
Rosy’s, that she had put lying beside one another, 
snuggled up like a pair of kittens on a shake down in 
the comer ; “ ’twas God that done it, that poor Rosy 
left that child of hers here with me, and she making 
off through the rain this morning. ...” 

“Troth, I dunno!” says Dan; “I’m thinking 
we had enough of our own here, without that little 
girleen of Art Heffernan’s as well!” 


302 The Folk of Furry Farm 

“ Won’t we have plenty for all, with a blessing?” 
said Kitty; “and the way they do be knocked 
about in the Union! I couldn’t bear the thoughts 
of it!” 

Dan said no more then. He went off, as soon as 
he could, the next morning. And Kitty was to 
spend another lonely day, for he never came back 
till it was night. 

“Well?” said Kitty, running out to the door to 
meet him. 

“Well, I went up,” said Dan, sitting down 
upon the settle, and beginning to tell the whole 
story, “and they both were there, listening, and 
never said a word, till I happened to mention the 
old name; something I said about Rosy and Art 
Heffernan do ye mind? And the name had no 
sooner crossed me lips when ‘Yoke up!’ says 
Mickey; ‘ and let you come along with me, Dan!’ ” 

“‘For what?’ says Marg. 

“What answer he made her, or if he made any 
at all, I can’t tell you, but away we drove, Mickey 
and meself. And when we got to the Union, 
there! wasn’t poor little Rosy in the dead-house 
too, alongside the mother; the two of them lying 
there together. ...” 

“The Lord receive them and mark them to 


Rosy at Furry Farm 303 

grace, I pray!” said Kitty, and she crossed 
herself. 

“Heffeman went straight off,” said Dan; “and 
he never cried crack, till he had all arranged to 
have them took to the Furry Farm, back to his own 
place. And, moreover, has a funeral and wake 
ordered, in the greatest of style!” 

“The Lord reward him, whatever!” said Kitty; 
“. . . and the child . . . ? what did they say 
about her?” 

“Whethen now, I dunno,” said Dan, looking a 
bit ashamed. 

“I’ll go bail, you never as much as spoke of 
her!” said Kitty, quite jealous about Rosy’s 
baby; “men does be very queer betimes. But 
you had your share to be talking over!” 

“Ay, we had so,” said Dan; “and along with 
all, Marg never gave me the opportunity; very 
strange and silent in herself she was, all through. ” 

“Do you tell me that!” said Kitty. 

“I was thinking in me own mind,” said Dan, 
“could she have any thought of all the times ould 
Heffeman used to be going to Rafferty’s, and the 
talk there was about he going to marry Rosy!” 

“Ay, indeed!” said Kitty, “and the Widdah, 
the innocent poor woman that she was! saying all 


304 The Folk of Furry Farm 

she’d do, when she and Rosy would be settled in at 
the Furry Farm!” 

“Little she thought, those days, that it would 
be feet foremost the two of them would be, going 
there!” said Dan. 

Kitty thought a minute and then said she, 
“And as for whatever courting old Mickey had 
with Rosy, sure Marg mightn’t mind that. ’Twas 
a thing of nothing! Look at the len’th of time 
Heffeman was looking out, till he got Marg to 
take him! He was always to be made a hare of, 
the same Mickey, till now that he has her to look 
to and make him respected. . . . And neither 
might Marg care for the laugh that went round 
. . . sure, poor Art and Rosy weren’t half as 
bad as we ourselves. ...” 

Fretted and all as she was, Kitty couldn’t but 
smile at the thought of the trick she and Dan 
played on Heffeman. 

“Marg will see that no one makes a fool of 
Mickey now, at any rate!” said Dan; “but to give 
every one their merit, she’s as anxious as he is 
now, to pay every respect to them that are gone. ” 

Kitty began to cry again at that. 

“God’s good, that brought mother and child 
together in the latter end!” said she; “and sure, 


305 


Rosy at Furry Farm 

they were just made upon one another, Rosy and 
the Widdah Rafferty. ...” 

The funeral took place, and a most pitiful sight 
it was, to see the two coffins going off together, 
past the end of the little boreen where the Raf- 
fertys used to live, and on to the graveyard of 
Clough-na-Rinka. There was a fine wake before 
that; full and plenty of everything, so that even 
Dark Moll hadn’t a word to say, only compli- 
ments. 

“But what else could a body expect?” says she 
to Marg, “your mother’s child couldn’t but do 
the thing decent, when you’d go about it ! and the 
same at the Furry Farm itself. A good depend- 
ence Mr. Heffeman is for all that are living 
under him, and of course that’s what Kitty and 
Dan Grennan are looking to, when they were so 
ready to agree to keep the babby ; and it a Heffer- 
nan, too!” 

Marg made no answer to Moll about this. It’s 
a thing often to be remarked, how that a man and 
his wife will grow to be like one another. Marg 
Molally had never been much of a talker; and now 
that she was Marg Heffeman, she wasn’t getting 
much practice at chin-wagging, and had grown 
nearly as silent as Mickey himself. 


20 


306 The Folk of Furry Farm 

She said nothing, but what Moll had remarked 
made her think. It’s a little puff that will make a 
blazing fire. Moll had put into words what had 
been floating through her own mind. 

The little baby at Grennan’s! and it a Heffer- 
nan! Well Marg was aware, though Mickey had 
never said so, that he’d wish to have one of the old 
name to come after him. And she shared that 
feeling, in a way. She was beginning to feel a pride 
in the Furry Farm and everything about the place 
that was her home now. Why wouldn’t Art’s 
child have some rights there? The people used to 
be saying, before Art had gone off with Rosy, 
that he stood a good chance for coming in for 
whatever Mickey had to leave. Then why not 
this baby? 

But what would Heffeman himself say to this? 
He mightn’t care for it at all. There would be the 
expense. . . . Marg had always been a careful 
girl, but she was more so than ever now. She 
couldn’t be near and narrow, like Mickey himself ; 
it wasn’t in her. But she knew he’d like to see her 
saving. So she got the fashion of it, to humour 
the old man that was so good to her in his own 
way. . . . And how would he like to see money 
being spent on Art’s child? 


307 


Rosy at Furry Farm 

And a child that wasn’t her own! how would 
that be? Marg Heffeman was really puzzled 
about it. She couldn’t let the thoughts of the 
little child out of her mind ; it kept coming between 
her and her work in the daytime and her rest at 
night. And it was all the harder on her, be- 
cause she kept it all to herself. Speak of it to 
Mickey? She couldn’t do that. If he’d say 
“no!” away would go the dreams. . . . For 
she never went against her husband in anything. 
But if only . . . 

There’s how she was considering the thing, over 
and over, up and down and every way, one 
evening that she was crossing the fields to Kitty 
Grennan’s. The fuss of the wake and funeral was 
over by then, and the Furry Farm was more like 
itself again. 

Before she reached the house at all, she could 
hear the singing and laughing and noise going on 
inside, the same as ever, only more so. And 
when she got there, and was leaning in over the 
half-door, there, hadn’t Kitty the big washing- 
tub over by the fire, on the floor, and she kneeling 
beside it, talking and chirping away, that it would 
do you good to be listening to her. 

“God bless your work!” said Marg. 


308 The Folk of Furry Farm 

“. . . And you, too! ,, says Kitty, just barely 
looking up at her, she was so busy. 

“What’s this at all you’re at, woman dear? ” 

“What indeed, only bathing me two little 
babbies I am!” said Kitty, laughing through the 
steam. 

Marg stood a minute, and then she said, “Is it 
that yous have that child here yet?” 

“Where else?” said Kitty. 

“Well, I dunno,” said Marg; “I suppose every 
one knows their own business best ...” and 
whatever came over her, to make her say that, 
she didn’t know; as if she was faulting the Gren- 
nans. 

But it made no odds what she said. Kitty gave 
her no answer. Maybe she didn’t hear what 
Marg was after saying. She just burst out 
laughing. 

“Ora, Marg, will you look-at-here ! ” she said; 
“you’d think little Miss Heffernan, as I do call 
poor Rosy’s baby, was striving to r’ise herself up 
out of the tub of water, the way she could get a 
look at you! She’s the cunningest little era- 
ture ... !” 

Marg went in at that, and over beside the tub. 

“Take care! take care, Kitty!” she said; 


309 


Rosy at Furry Farm 

“maybe you’d let one of them slip . . . and 
wouldn’t they be very easy drownded, and they so 
small!” 

“Och, the sorra fear!” said Kitty; “I could be 
handling a half-score of them, and be making me 
soul, at the same time!” 

Of course, she was a practised hand by then. 

“Let me! ah! let me be at them, too!” said 
Marg; and down with her on her two knees, and 
began at the baby that was nearest to her in the 
tub. And when she felt the soft little body in her 
hands, and the warm, pleasant water with the 
soap-bubbles floating and winking upon it, her own 
eyes began to shine, and her cheeks grew like 
roses. Ten years younger she appeared to Kitty 
to become, that minute; and a shy, happy smile 
on her mouth, like a girl again. 

“There now,” said Kitty, lifting the other baby 
out upon her lap; “we have one a-piece! But 
how did you know so well to take the right child? ” 

It was only by chance it happened. But Marg 
was holding the Heffeman baby in her arms. 
And Kitty saw now that the tears were running 
down poor Marg’s face. So she pretended not to 
see that, and began sharing out the baby-clothes 
into two heaps, and instructing Marg, that had 


3io The Folk of Furry Farm 


never done the like before, how to dress the baby. 
And then she got its food ready, and gave the cup 
into Marg’s hand. 

And Marg did all, just as Kitty directed her, as 
mild as if she was an infant child herself. Her 
eyes kept bright with tears, but they stopped 
falling, and there remained the same soft smile 
upon her lips. 

She never so much as lifted a look from the 
baby, till she had done feeding her, and had her 
rocked to sleep upon her knee, Kitty sitting op- 
posite her and doing the same ; and neither of the 
women speaking, till the babies were sound asleep. 

Then Marg stood up, with Rosy’s child in her 
arms, and she said, “Now we must be off with 
ourselves; let you be putting the cloak about me! 
there it is, upon the floor, where I let it down off 
me, before I began at the child. . . . Mind now, 
take care what you’re doing! You might smother 
the baby, easy. And now let me be shortening 
the way home. It wouldn’t answer to be keeping 
this little laneen out too late. ...” 

“Is it taking her away with you, you are!” 
said Kitty, very astonished at the thoughts of 
Marg walking off like that with the poor little 
stray child in her arms. 


Rosy at Furry Farm 31 1 

“What else, what else? I can’t leave her after 
me! I’ll not go without her! Och, Kitty, haven’t 
you the full up of the house of your own ; and why 
wouldn’t I have this one little child?” 

“Why not, indeed?” said Kitty. 

But it was to herself she said it. Marg never 
waited for any answer, only walked off with the 
child. She never as much as said, “Good-even- 
ing!” or turned her head to look at Kitty, and she 
standing at the door with her own child hugged up 
to her. 

“God help her, I think it’s what poor Marg 
must be bewitched, to go do such a thing as that! 
And what will old Mickey say?” thinks Kitty, 
turning back into the house, to lay her own baby 
into the cradle, and feeling lonesome that the 
other one was gone. Kitty was foolish that way. 

And as Marg was moving home, she kept saying 
to herself, “What will Mickey say? But I don’t 
care! I’ll not give you back, even to Kitty ! No! 
and sooner than the Union, I’ll walk the roads 
with you, asthore, if there should be any objec- 
tions made to you being at the Furry Farm!” 

And every now and then, she’d kiss it and snug 
it up close to her very heart. Then the baby 
would give a little whimper, and go off to sleep 


312 The Folk of Furry Farm 

again. She never really wakened at all, indeed; 
only lay so still, that Marg stopped more than 
once, frightened, thinking it was what she had 
the baby smothered. 

But she needn’t have been uneasy about that! 
And as for Heffeman. . . . 

When Marg got home, she walked straight in to 
where Mickey was sitting in the kitchen by the 
fireside. And she opened back her cloak; and 
the child began to stretch herself in the heat, and 
to laugh and crow. 

Mickey that was surprised ! and no wonder. He 
nearly jumped off his stool at the sight of the baby. 
And Marg was too excited and breathless at first to 
explain the thing. He had time to take the pipe 
from his mouth, and to knock the ashes out of it 
against the toe of his brogue, before she got to say, 
and she catching her breath every minute with a 
kind of a sob, “I’ve brought that child of Art’s 
here, out of Grennan’s . . . and not to see her 
being sent to the Union bey ant to be reared . . . 
and it would be a disgrace to the name of Heffeman 
. . . and if there’s a word of objections to be made 
to her, let it be said now ! I can go off somewhere 
else. . . . Not a fear of me, but I’ll be well able to 
earn what will do the both of us . . . well able I 


3i3 


Rosy at Furry Farm 

am . . and she rocking the baby in her arms, 
and keeping a tight hold upon it, as if she was in 
dread of poor Mickey taking it from her. 

Heffeman said nothing for a minute; always 
tedious he was; and says Marg, beginning again, 
^Fve brought the child here . . 

“Ora, what else, woman dear?” said Mickey. 


CHAPTER IX 


COMRADE CHILDREN AT THE FURRY FARM 

Well, Marg brought that child home with her, 
and when she did, she was so excited that she 
scarce knew what she was doing; bringing an old 
house on her head, as the saying is. But if she had 
known itself, or had taken time to think, would 
that have hindered her? 

Not it! She had been the best of a daughter, 
and a sister, and wife ; always doing for others, and 
forgetting herself. But with all the love she had 
given out, there was more left still in her heart 
than had ever been spent. It must have been 
waiting there for that baby of Rosy’s. For once 
Marg got the feel of it in her arms, small and 
soft and helpless, she knew it was what she 
had been hungry for, those years upon years 
past, and had given up all hopes of ever having 
for herself. 

And now, at last she had it, and she was satis- 
fied. No one else wanted that grand little baby; 
314 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 315 

no one else had any call or claim to it. It wasn’t 
of the Union Marg was thinking, really ; let alone of 
Grennan’s being so poor a little home, that to have 
another mouth there to fill wasn’t lightly to be 
thought of. No, she made no account of these 
things. They were all lost in the one wish that 
was burning in her heart. She must have that 
child for her very own. 

And curious, too, it was, how little Marg seemed 
to consider Mickey himself in this matter, as if 
she didn’t care how he’d feel about the little new- 
comer! In fact, the night she brought the baby 
home, she was more like an old ewe with her lamb 
than anything else ; on for fight with even a strange 
dog that may happen by. And poor old Mickey, 
sitting there so peaceable! 

To give him his due, there never was a word said 
by him, as if he objected to the fuss of having the 
child there. Of course, it altered things a good 
deal. A baby coming into a house always does. 
And hasn’t it a right to? What are children for, 
only to teach us, in their own little way, by mak- 
ing us take care of them ! Sent down from heaven 
they are, to help to show us how to get there. It’s 
a queer sort of man, let alone a woman, but will be 
the better of having to do with a child. For you 


316 The Folk of Furry Farm 

have to be good to it ; and then it does good to you, 
back again. 

Now, Mickey was one of the best, if slow and 
silent ; but good and all as he was, you may easily 
imagine that he'd feel a bit put about betimes, at 
finding himself left to himself in such things as not 
having the stick within reach ; or putting his specs 
out of his hand and forgetting where they were; or 
having to wait of a morning to have his brogues 
laced upon his feet, because Marg would be 
engaged with the child. 

He’d say nothing; that was his way; just sit 
there, most patient. But it’s often he’d be won- 
dering how a thing so little would require so much ! 
For by the time Marg would have the baby bathed 
and dressed of a morning, and hushoed off to sleep 
at night, let alone the feeding of her through the 
day, there appeared to be little time for anything 
else to be done. Not that Marg did neglect the 
work. She managed it by getting up earlier and 
going to bed later, and so she would contrive to 
overtake all. And the things to be done seemed 
to her less trouble than ever now; because always 
there was the baby, waiting and wanting her, 
Marg Heffeman, and no one else. 

Marg would have been contented to spend all her 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 317 

time with the child, petting it upon her knee, and 
playing with its fingers, or making drakes’ tails out 
of the little soft wisps of hair upon the head of it! 
Not that I’m wanting to make little of the child or 
her hair, either! But at the beginning, she was 
next door to bald. As she grew big, she grew nice, 
and had the loveliest head of yellow curls you 
might ask to see. She had no touch of a Heffeman 
about her at all. 

That was the child that lit on her feet and no 
mistake, when she was brought to the Furry Farm ! 
She that was well minded; too well, in fact. 
Poor Marg could scarce bear the wind to blow or 
the sun to shine down upon her; only watching 
every turn, as if she thought some danger was 
waiting to happen to that child, if she took her own 
eye off her for a minute. 

There’s many a woman like that. And it may 
be right enough, as long as the child is helpless in 
your arms, because then they’re easily hurt. But 
it’s another case altogether when they begin to feel 
the little feet under them, and are able to run 
about. It was then that the real trouble began 
with little Bride. 

Here’s how it was. Marg used to dress her up 
very grandly. Nothing was too good for the child. 


318 The Folk of Furry Farm 

What could be got at Melia’s shop wouldn’t an- 
swer at all. So Marg would send off to Dublin, 
no less, by Tommy the Crab, that had got on well 
in the world since the morning he sold the pictures 
to poor Art and Rosy. . . . Tommy had a cart 
and horse now, and was a higgler; going about 
buying up ducks and chickens and so on. And 
he’d call in at the Furry Farm, and Marg would 
give him whatever eggs or fowl she had to sell; and 
he would bring her back all manner of fineries for 
little Bride, that he would choose when he’d be 
off in the Big Smoke; and very nice the child 
looked in what came out of the grand Dublin 
shop, Tommy being very tasty and experiented 
about such things. 

But what matter how she looked? Who was 
there to take notice whether it was a puce frock or 
a pink one she’d have on? Not one, except Marg 
herself. The Furry Farm wasn’t a place that was 
apt to be much frequented by people happening 
in, and Bride was too little still to be taken where 
she’d be seen. She might as well have been 
dressed in sacks. 

But if you do put good clothes on a child that 
size, you are making trouble for yourself, unless 
you can spend all your time watching them; the 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 319 

clothes, I mean. It would take a person all their 
time, running after one like little Bride, to keep 
her from doing destruction on her grandeur. 
Marg had plenty of other work that had to be 
done, so she began teaching the child the fashion 
of keeping quiet, and sitting on her creepy-stool 
in the comer. Brigeen was easily taught, being 
very biddable, so she’d sit there, quite good, 
till you’d have to pity her, waiting till Marg 
would give her leave to run out for a little while. 

Too anxious poor Marg was about the child, in 
every way! afraid of being too kind to her, and 
spoiling her by too much love; a thing impossible, 
if it’s right love; and afraid, too, of ever being 
cross enough to say a harsh word to her, let alone 
to punish the child, and she without either father 
or mother to take her part. Many a mother with 
an only child is not half as careful as Marg was 
with little Bride, that wasn’t her own at all, 
except through her own goodness. If only Marg 
could have taken a leaf out of Kitty Grennan’s 
book! Kitty, that had a houseful of children to 
contend with by that time, but took things rough 
and ready, so that her long family was less bother 
to her than the one at the Furry Farm was to 
Marg. 


320 The Folk of Furry Farm 

Why, if little Bride cried . . . ! But it was 
seldom that occurred. How could it? Bride was 
healthy and gay, and moreover had the best of 
care in every way. What had she to cry for? 

And still in all, there’s one thing that none of us 
can do well without, and that is, liberty to do what 
we want in our own way. And as well, children 
want some one the same age as themselves, to be 
company to them. Now, little Brigid had neither 
friends nor freedom. And that was hard on her, 
although, God knows! Marg meant nothing but 
kindness. 

The child began to be lonesome and forgotten- 
looking. Marg herself noticed it at times, and 
wondered what ailed her pet. She could not 
guess; but supposing she could, what was she to 
do? She might put her two eyes upon sticks, and 
it would be no use. A grown person can never 
go back and be a little child again. And that 
was what ailed little Bride mostly; the want of 
another child to play with. 

Now, strange enough, it was old Moll Reilly 
that first really seemed to know what the child 
was pining for. Dark and all as she was, she’d 
find out things that were going on, often far 
better than them that had their sight. She 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 321 

was sitting inside at Heffernan’s one evening, 
Marg being gone off to the well, and Heffeman 
himself outside seeing about the business being 
done, so that only Moll and the child were in the 
kitchen. And little Bride, after standing for 
some time with her finger in her mouth, came 
sidling over to the stool where Moll was sitting 
by the fire, and crept in as close as she could to the 
old woman, as if for company. 

“Why aren’t you off somewheres outside?” 
said Moll to the child, “playing about in the fields, 
where maybe you’d chance to meet up with the 
young Grennans? Or up on the Furry Hills? 
Grand it does be, there!” 

“I can’t,” said Bride, “because me mammy 
doesn’t like me to be anywhere that she can’t see 
me. Sometimes I do be put out into the yard, 
where she can be keeping an eye on me from the 
house; and she shuts the big gate that opens out 
into the fields . . . the way I’ll be safe from the 
cows . . . but they come to the other side of the 
gate and look through it at me with their wicked 
ould eyes . . . and I do be afeard of them. . . . 
And all round the yard, there’s walls and sheds, too 
high to look over. . . . Only there’s one little 
spot where the wall is all broken and very low 


21 


322 The Folk of Furry Farm 


down . . . and it’s there I do mostly go; where 
the little old bits of a house are. . . 

“And what do you be doing there, alanna?” 
said Moll. 

“Making a chaney-house,” said little Bride; 
“all the old jugs and cups that gets broken, me 
mammy gives them to me, and I have a big big 
round stone there to make them into little bits. 
... I’d bring you there, only you’d not be able 
to see how grand I have it!” 

“That’s a quare place for you to be! and do you 
never be lonesome there without one only your- 
self?” said Moll. 

And little Brigid laughed, and said, “Indeed and 
I’m not lonesome! there does always be some one 
with me there, where I make the chaneys. . . . ” 

“Your mammy, is it?” says Moll. 

“No, no! it’s not me mammy!” said Brigid, 
looking down at the floor and then all round the 
kitchen as if she was puzzled; “it’s . . . it’s 
some one ... I don’t know ...” 

“What are they like, that do be there with 
you?” asked Moll. 

Brigid made no answer to this, but began 
twisting her little hands together, and kicking 
one foot to and fro. And there was no more to be 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 323 

said then, for here was Marg back with her can 
of water swinging by her side; and Heffeman 
himself, limping in to look for his tea. And the 
kettle hadn’t boiled, and the fire was low, and 
things seemed all behindhand. 

Marg fed the child, and thought to get her off to 
her bed at once. But whatever queer spirit was in 
little Bride, whether it could have been that she 
was excited by the talk she had been having with 
Moll about the old bits of ruined wall and her 
chaney-house and the “some one” that was always 
there with her or not, it’s hard to say; only Marg 
could get no good of her at all. She would do 
nothing she was bid, only running this way and 
that way, and laughing when Marg pretended to 
get angry with her. 

But at long last, Moll, knowing that Mickey was 
getting worn out with it all and she herself in the 
want of her supper, thought she’d put in her word. 

So she said, “There now; too much laughing 
ends in crying. See here, Bridie, be a good child ! 
Look at . . . look at how well little Judy and Pat 
are behaving, playing about there and no bother to 
any one ...” and she pretended to be watching, 
or rather listening to a couple of children at the 
other end of the kitchen. 


324 The Folk of Furry Farm 

Brigid, that had been rushing about, laughing 
and shouting, stopped like a shot at that, and 
looked up at Moll. 

“Where, where are they?” she said; “who’s Pat 
and Judy? . . . where do you see them . . . ?” 

“Look at them! Off there, beyant your 
mammy’s spinning-wheel, hiding themselves . . . 
that’s why you can’t see them . . . and there, 
now! there they are, going off good to their beds 
as soon as they’re told. . . . ” ' 

At that Brigid, who had been all noise and 
movement, stood still; and the laugh died off her 
lips, and her eyes grew big and shining, as she 
looked up, but seeming to see nothing. And then 
she lifted her little arms, and away she went, as if 
she was floating, floating, upon a wave of the sea. 
And as she crossed the floor and disappeared 
through the door of the kitchen, they could hear 
her saying in a half- whisper, “Are you there, 
Judy? Is Patsy with you?” 

And then she’d go on to answer her own ques- 
tion, “Ay, indeed, are we here! and will be in bed 
and asleep before you. ...” 

“And by that means, ” said Moll, telling all this 
one day to Kitty Grennan, that she had called in 
to see on her rounds, “by that means, I got the 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 325 

better of the child, and she was no more trouble 
that evening, and Marg was able to attend to the 
business and Heffeman himself, and get all done. 
It’s no way to be going on, to have everybody 
waiting in order to humour a child!” 

“If it was my case,” said Kitty, “I’d just give 
her a few little slaps. ...” 

“So you would, and you’d be right, too. But 
Marg is that particular! And what is little 
Brigeen there, only a cuckoo?” 

“Not at all!” said Kitty; “where there’s a 
cuckoo in a nest, he’ll be pushing out the other 
young birds, to take all himself. But there’s no 
one at the Furry Farm for little Bride to be in- 
terfering with ; there she is, bird alone ! And so, 
that’s how it comes to pass, what Dan was telling 
me about, only last night, that he seen at Heffer- 
nan’s. He chanced to be there a bit late, and a 
windy sort of a night it was, and neither raining 
nor letting it alone, only the air dark with the wet 
that ought to fall and wasn’t. And Dan said, 
you’d think there was a whole troop of children 
playing and chattering and laughing, in the comer 
of the yard where the bit of the old Heffeman 
castle is, they say. It was afterwards he thought 
how queer it was! he was in too great a hurry then, 


326 The Folk of Furry Farm 

to pass any remarks, for we none of us care to be 
too late crossing the Furry Hills at night . . 

“ You’re right in that, too!” said Moll. 

“. . . but Dan said,” Kitty went on, “that it 
was after he got back here he began to think it 
over . . . and sure, he thought it was the strangest 
thing, to say there was no one there only little 
Bride, and she was going on talking and making 
answer then back to herself, as if she had a couple 
of Comrade Children there with her . . . and even 
dogs she was talking to! One she called Bixey 
and another was Slangs; and she’d scold them, 
most bitter and natural; and then she’d pet them 
and make up friends with them again. . . . And 
sure there was neither child nor dog in that place, 
only Bridie herself! It was a fright, Dan said!” 

“So it was, a fright,” Moll said, “and appears 
most curious too ! But now I must be off about me 
business. ...” 

“What hurry are you in?” said Kitty; “Dan is 
gone off to-day with Heffeman . . . some busi- 
ness or other. ...” 

“If that’s so,” said Moll, “I may’s well give 
poor Marg a look in; lonesome the crature does 
be there. . . .” 

So with that, she waddled off, big cloak and 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 327 

stick and all. She guessed she had got all Kitty 
had to spare for her, there not being too much in 
that house, by reason of all the children. And 
when she heard of Mickey not being at home, she 
bethought her that it would be a good opportunity 
for making a call at the Furry Farm. Marg, she 
knew, would be more free to give, when himself 
wasn’t there. 

But when Moll got to Heffeman’s, it wasn’t 
what she expected that she found there. She 
looked to be brought into a quiet, orderly, comfort- 
able place, such as Marg’s kitchen had the name 
of always being; and getting well fed and com- 
forted in every way there. But the whole place 
was upside down. Not a hand’s turn had been 
done there since the breakfast was ett; everything 
through-other, and poor Marg herself running up 
and down and here and there, like a mad-woman. 

Little Brigid was sitting on her creepy-stool by 
the fire, pale and shivering with the fright; and 
the big tears were streaming down her face. 

“Ora, what’s this at all at all? or what’s the 
matter?” said Moll, who dark and all as she was, 
as I said before, could always give a good guess at 
what was going on, and in particular if it was any- 
thing wrong. 


328 The Folk of F'urry Farm 


“I’m distracted!” said Marg; “out of me seven 
senses I am, and don’t know what I’m doing or 
saying, and has me poor little darlint there terri- 
fied! It’s the teethaches I have, and never closed 
an eye these two nights, only walking the floor . . . 
and I tried all the remedies I can hear of. . . 

“The teethaches!” said Moll; “God help you, 
then, but it’s you that are to be pitied! Meself 
that used to be mortified with them, till all the 
teeth fell out. I got some ease then. But as for 
remedies, there’s no certain cure that ever I could 
hear of . . . . There’s charms, of course. And then 
there’s that Fairy Doctor ... he lives on beyant 
Clough-na-Rinka ... a seventh son he is, and 
does a lot of cures. It’s often I used to be thinking 
if only he was at that work of doing cures before 
my eyes got so bad . . . but sure, it’s all the will 
of God! and nothing to be done for them poor 
eyes now; that day’s gone by for me. But for 
teethaches . . . he’s most notorious for curing 
them. All he’ll do, is just pass his hand across 
the bad tooth, and the pain leaves it that instant 
minute. ...” 

“I thought of him, over and over,” said Marg; 
“but how can I get to go, and himself gone off 
with the side-car? . . . I’d have to walk every 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 329 

step of the way. And it would be too far to carry 
the child ; and worse to be leaving her here 
by herself. ... I wouldn’t know what might 
happen her. . . . And the car’ll not be back till 
dark. ...” 

“Sure, what of that?” said Moll; “can’t I be 
sitting here till either of yous is back, and keep an 
eye ... I mean, be minding the child? and let 
you go in the name of God!” 

So that took place. Marg rolled her cloak about 
her and went flying off at a sweep’s trot, to get 
cured by the Fairy Doctor; and Moll settled her- 
self in by the chimney-corner, in Mickey’s own 
big chair. She was a very gay old body, the very 
sort that children always love to be with. So be- 
fore very long, she had little B rigid sitting on her 
lap, talking away. 

“You do be very lonesome here betimes, don’t 
you?” said Moll. 

“I do, middling,” said Brigid; “I am this even- 
ing, with every one gone off . . . and Pat and 
Judy, that I do mostly have to play with, are gone 
too. Off a long ways they are ; gone to buy hay for 
foddering the cattle, for the grass is beginning to 
run very short. ...” 

That was the very word she had heard Heffer- 


33° The Folk of Furry Farm 

nan saying when he was starting off with Dan 
awhile before. And whatever Brigid knew to be 
going on, she and her Comrade Children were to 
do the same. 

“Where’s that you sent me mammy to?” she 
said then; “a Fairy Doctor, is it? and what kind 
of a thing is that?” 

“Oh, there’s different sorts of Fairy-men,” said 
Moll; “and, moreover, of Fairy- women, too! 
Didn’t my very grandmother meet a Fairy- woman 
one evening, and she coming home from a dance 
at the cross-roads; ay, and the Fairy- woman had 
seven fairy children after her ...” 

11 Seven children!” said Brigid, growing red at 
the thought. 

“. . . and they all dressed in grand red cloaks! 
And long hair as yellow as butter in June, and it 
streaming down their backs . . . and golden 
crowns upon their heads ...” 

“. . . Upon their heads!” said Bride, with her 
eyes shining and her face quite pale now at the 
thought of all this. 

“Upon their heads, of course! where else?” 
said Moll; she might easy have known better than 
to go on spouting out of her like that to the inno- 
cent poor child . . . “ and riding upon ponies they 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 331 

do be . . . white ponies, with long tails flying 
behind them in the wind, they go so fast. . . 

“ Where, where? I’d like to see them!” said 
the child, her little voice choking with wonder at 
all Moll was telling her. 

“Whethen now, they do be in a-many places,” 
said Moll; “the Furry Hills at the back of this 
very house used to be full up of them ... is still, 
for all I know. ...” 

With that, she bethought her of what Marg had 
said, about taking care of the child. And she be- 
gan to consider that maybe Bride’s mind might 
get upset, and that she’d take the notion of going 
off to look for the fairies herself. 

So Moll went on to say, “But all that happened 
a very long time ago; and little girls mustn’t be 
too venturesome, only do as they’re bid, and then 
there will nothing happen to them!” 

But it’s the first word that counts. Little 
Brigid took no heed of this warning. She was 
standing beside Moll now, with the little rosy 
hand laid upon the old woman’s cheeky apron, 
and she looking up at her, and listening, listening, 
to every word that was said. 

And now she went across to the half-door, that 
she was just able to peep over, by standing upon 


33 2 The Folk of Furry Farm 


her tippy-toes; and Moll could hear her saying, 
in a whisper, “Pat! Judy! are yous there? 
Mind now and see to get that hay off the carts 
and . . . and ...” 

She stopped at that, because, like many another 
that might be wishing to give directions, she 
didn’t know very well herself what ought to be 
done. She used to listen to Marg and Mickey, 
without appearing to mind them, and then, what- 
ever they said, she would repeat it to the Comrade 
Children, when no one would be by that would 
maybe laugh at her. There’s nothing a child 
hates more than to be made fun of. But she 
managed so that there wasn’t a hand’s turn done 
about the Furry Farm but she would have the 
same going on, with herself and Pat and Judy. 

Moll often said afterwards, that it gave her a turn 
as if she was listening to something not right, to 
hear the little voice talking away, and then answer- 
ing itself back, “ So we will, Brigeen, do all you say! 
But when are you coming out here to play with us? 
Tired we are, waiting on you. ...” 

Before there was time to make any reply to 
that, Brigid ran back to Moll, and said, “Here’s 
himself, coming back!” 

On the minute, Moll began to stir herself. She 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 333 

never had any great hopes out of Mickey, in the 
way of what he might give her. She knew how 
hard he always got it, to part money; and so, as 
soon as she had it all explained to him, about Marg 
being away, and had got the penny that Mickey 
handed to her when he was down off the car, she 
said, “Now that you’re here, Mr. Heffeman, I 
may’s well be making the road short. The child 
will be right enough with you about the place . . . 
and Dan too. ...” 

Mickey didn’t say against her; he had no great 
wish for having Moll in the kitchen. 

So she went off, and Heffeman stumped into the 
house, and planked himself down in his chair by 
the fire. He gave a look round, and there he saw 
B rigid, sitting on her creepy, looking as if butter 
wouldn’t melt in her mouth, she was so meek. 

“Well, Missie!” said Heffeman; for there’s the 
name he had for the child. 

She said nothing, but he took no notice, and not 
long after, he fell asleep. He was old, and tired 
after the long day he had had, driving. 

Bride watched him for a while. Then, when she 
had made sure that he was sound asleep, she rose 
up off her stool, and crept over very softly to the 
half-door again. 


334 The Folk of Furry Farm 

She had no delay in opening it, because Mickey 
had not fastened it as Marg always did, in a way 
the child did not understand yet. B rigid peeped 
out. There was no one in sight. Dan was gone 
off, after unyoking the old mare, to drive in the 
cows to be milked. There wasn’t a picture of a 
man about the yard. 

It was the kind of a spring’s evening that you 
would think it a sin to stop in the house ; cold and 
bright and no wind stirring. Here and there you 
could hear a little bird tuning up, but there was 
little signs of growth on anything yet. Little 
Bride thought something was saying to her, 
4 'Come out! come out!” as she stood a minute 
half -ways through the door. 

She looked back at Heffeman. Was he really 
asleep, she wondered, or only pretending? He 
gave a sigh, and she was satisfied and looked out 
again, and said, in a whisper, “Are yous there? 
Patsy! have you the hay above in the loft. . . ?” 

“Ay, have I!” she made answer to herself; 
“and me and Judy only waiting on you, to go off 
to the chaney-house to play. ...” 

“Is it there we’ll go?” said the real child. 

“No! why would we?” said the Comrade 
Children; “we’re tired of playing there! We’d 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 335 

like to go away, away! out beyant the yard, and 
up into the rath on the hill . . . and maybe we'd 
get to see some of the Good People there and ..." 

“Sure I wouldn’t be let to do that!" said little 
Brigid. 

“Och, come along!" answers the Comrade 
Children; “won’t your own Pat and Judy be with 
you, and won’t let anything happen to you?" 

“Do yous know the way?" 

“Ay do we! weren’t we often there, and even 
went into the hill itself! follied after the Fairy- 
woman that was looking for the sup of new milk 
for the fairy baby, and it lying there upon her lap 
sick for the want of nourishment ! And it was we 
that ‘milked the tether’ for her to get it from 
Marg’s dairy into the rath. ..." 

“The time the grand big cow went back in her 
milk . . . and me mammy was that put out! 
. . . And will we see the fairy children, with their 
crowns of gold upon them, and they riding, and 
long red cloaks upon their backs, and . . . ?" 

“To be sure we will! see all there is to see!" 
said the Comrade Children; “only let you hurry, 
and not be keeping us waiting here all night on 
you. ..." 

Then out of the door goes little Brigid, talking 


336 The Folk of Furry Farm 

all the time to herself, and answering herself back 
as if there was a whole regiment of children in the 
place, instead of only herself. 

She ran straight to that choice spot of hers, 
where the small little remains of the old castle 
of the Heffemans was. And there she stood a 
minute, listening, you’d think. All that remained 
there now of the old building that had once been 
so grand and fine was a couple or three bits of 
walls, half-roofed, very thick and strong. In one 
of them there was a pointy long-shaped hole, like 
where the window of a chapel might have been. 
Many a time Brigid had stood, and had looked at 
the hole, and had longed to climb up and out 
through it, to see what was on the other side, only 
Marg had always checked her. So of course the 
child couldn’t but know that her mammy wouldn’t 
wish her to go through there. 

But now it seemed as if she forgot all that! 
She scrambled up and out through the window; 
she half fell, half jumped on to the long grass 
outside. Of course she had no call to do the like; 
but don’t we all act contrary at times? and it’s 
often you’ll hear it said, “Where’s the sense in 
being young, if you’re not foolish?” Little 
Bride just picked herself up; stood still a minute, 


■ Comrade Children at Furry Farm 337 

looking back at the hole. Then she held out the 
two little hands, the soft, rosy little hands that 
Marg loved to kiss, as if to catch hold of other 
hands ; and off she started, running as fast as the 
little feet would carry her, towards the Hill of 
the Rath, that was dim and fading already into 
the night. 

Inside in the kitchen, Mickey slept ahead for a 
while; long enough in fact for it to be middling 
dark when he began to stir himself and waken up. 
Then he looked about him, and missed Marg, 
and remembered all that was after happening, and 
that she was gone off, and the child left in his 
charge. She had been sitting on her creepy in the 
comer. He looked over to see if she was there 
still. The stool was, but the little girl was gone. 

At first, Heffeman didn’t mind so much, 
thinking it was only outside Bride should be. So 
he gave a great shout of a call to her, and even 
when there was no answer, he only thought, “She 
mustn’t be far; I did no more than close me eyes 
for a minute of time!” half ashamed, the way the 
most of us are about taking a doze by the fire ; as if, 
you’d think, it was one of the seven deadly sins 
to fall asleep anywhere only in your bed. 

But when no Bride appeared, after a bit Mickey 


22 


33 8 The Folk of Furry Farm 

grew uncomfortable in himself. He got up and 
limped over to the door, to see could he see the 
child in the yard. It wasn’t till he found that the 
night was settling down dark and quiet, that 
the real lonesomeness came over him! He called 
again, but of course there was nothing, only echo 
from the old walls for him to hear. Little Brigid 
was too far away for any shout from him to 
reach her. 

“What will I do, at all at all?” thinks Heffer- 
nan to himself; “I wish to God Marg was back 
here ! What a thing for her to go do, to be getting 
the teethaches this day of all days, and leave me 
here to be annoyed with the child going astray on 
me! And sure, if anything was to happen little 
Missie, Marg would never over it!” 

He felt now that he’d give a good deal to see 
little Bride come trotting up to the door; and he 
strained his eyes out into the darkness as if by 
that he thought he might get her back. 

Many’s the time he had thought it long, when 
he’d have to wait his turn till Marg would be 
done with the child; and he might sit there, 
lonely and forgotten and as if he was no con- 
sequence, till the child would be dressed and fed 
and all to that. But he had never said a word 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 339 

of a complaint, and now it was all past. He 
could only see the look on Marg’s face, when she’d 
have Brigid on her knee, warm and smiling after 
her bath; or latterly, the way she’d be folding 
the little hands for her, and getting her to say her 
prayers, before she’d be put into her bed. Heffer- 
nan was half -wild, thinking how fretted Marg would 
be, if she came home and found the child gone. 

“She’d never stop here at all, wanting her!” he 
said to himself. 

That minute, he heard Dan’s foot outside, and 
he called to him, and gave him instructions. He 
wasn’t to mind anything, mare or cows either, 
only run off to search for the child ; first at the well, 
and then at the old quarry-hole; and if he got no 
signs of her at either of those places, he was to take 
off along the high-road, after a band of tinkers 
that Heffeman and he had passed that day coming 
home after buying the hay. 

“Sure, what would they want with the child?” 
said Dan; “doesn’t the like of them have the 
full-up of their ass-carts of fine children of their 
own?” 

“Be giving me none of your chat!” said Heffer- 
nan to him, pretty severe; and at that, off went 
Dan. He was anxious enough himself by then. 


34° The Folk of Furry Farm 

When Dan was gone, Mickey felt worse than 
ever. 

“How am I to stop here,” he thought, “or 
how could I face Marg, if she comes back to 
find Missie gone? Maybe it’s what she’d show 
fight. ...” She might say, wasn’t it a queer 
thing, that he couldn’t look after the child for one 
evening, and she that had always done everything 
for him, those years past ! And well he knew that 
himself! He couldn’t call to mind any time that 
he had asked Marg to do a thing for him, but she 
was ready for the job. And to say he couldn’t do 
that much for her, only dropping off asleep . . . ! 

He couldn’t keep inside. He hobbled out into 
the yard again, and tried to look through the 
darkness that had fallen now over everything 
around. 

“It would be very simple for any one to go 
astray now, let alone a little child!” he thinks to 
himself. 

On the minute, he began to call to mind the 
time he had lost a lamb once, and that it was 
above upon the Hill of the Rath he had found it. 

“And why wouldn’t a child be the same as a 
lamb, and try to get up higher always, when it 
would be lost?” he thought to himself; “and a 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 341 

poor thing it would be, if anything was to happen 
Brigeen now and she half reared . . . and a 
Heffeman too . . . and along with all, to think 
of the way Marg is made upon her! thinks the 
sun rises and sets in that child!” 

With that, off stumps Heffeman, out through 
the yard into the fields beyond, towards where 
the Hill of the Rath rose up, dark and bristly, a 
piece off from the house. The moon was just 
commencing to rise, so that he had some light 
to show him where to put his poor old feet and 
he limping along. 

He hadn’t been up the Furry Hills for many a 
day, not since he got the game leg that indeed 
hindered him of a-many a thing he might be wish- 
ing to do. But he set himself real courageous now 
to climb the Hill of the Rath; and you’d wonder 
how sprightly he went up it. 

And as he worked his way, he could call to mind 
many a queer story of what was to be seen about 
that rath; stories he had heard from his very 
father; how that, one day and they sowing oats, 
just about that time of the year, didn’t there a 
weeny little red cap drop from out of the rath, 
right where they were working! And some boy 
ran to pick it up, but before he could reach it, my 


34 2 The Folk of Furry Farm 


dear, didn’t a great furl of wind rise it off of the 
ground and blew it back into the rath again! 
And they all thought to hear a great laugh ! 

And another day, a third cousin of his father’s 
was gathering nuts, and he a young boy at the 
time, and it was from trees that grew on the side 
of the Hill of the Rath he was picking them. And 
suddenly, there was a lovely young girl, and she 
dressed in green, smiling at him very pleasant. 
And then she disappeared, as if the hill had opened 
to take her in. 

“It’s no place for a little child to be, whatever!” 
thought Heffernan to himself; “and maybe 
would get a fright there that would last her for her 
lifetime ! Or maybe not be let come back at all, 
only a ‘Visit’ sent in her place . . . !” 

Mind you, it was hard work enough for any one 
at any time to get up that hill, let alone an old 
lame fellow like Mickey, and it the night. The 
place was all grown over, too, with briers and 
thorns and nut-trees; and big stones lay loose 
here and there, and made the going very rough. 
But Heffernan persevered on, until he got to 
the top, and then he climbed down into the 
rath ; and very lonesome it appeared, and darker 
than ever the night was, when he got to the 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 343 

bottom of it, where a very old, twisted thorn-bush 
grew. 

Something white was under the shelter of that 
bush; no more, you might think, than a gleam of 
the moonlight that was just beginning to peep 
in over the edge of the hollow of the rath. But 
to Mickey that white thing looked like the stray 
lamb he had found there, in that very spot, long 
ago. He went over and stooped down, and laid his 
hand upon it; and what was there, only little 
Brigid, lying there curled up like a kitten! And 
she was so tired that when Heffeman picked her 
up, she only stirred herself round in his arms, and 
settled herself off to sleep again. 

Well, how Mickey got down that steep, rough 
path and he with the child to carry, is more than 
I can tell you, or indeed more than he could un- 
derstand himself. But he did it. He got her 
safe home. When he had her inside by the fire, 
he could see that her little face and arms were 
scratched and bruised and tom with briers; and 
so were her grand little clothes, and muddied, 
where she must have slipped and fallen a few times. 

“But what odds for all, when she’s found and 
safe at home, before Marg is back!” said Heffer- 
nan to himself, as he was letting himself down into 


344 The Folk of Furry Farm 

his big chair very carefully, the way he wouldn’t 
waken little Bride, lying asleep in his arms. 

While all this was going on, Marg, God help her! 
was galloping along on her way home, very happy 
at being rid of the teethaches, that had left her 
soon after she had been with that Fairy Doctor. 
There’s people very wise that will tell you such a 
thing can’t be, but you’ll see such cures done about 
Ardenoo. It was so with Marg, anyway, and she 
was in good heart, hurrying back to the child and 
Mickey and carrying a couple or three little mat- 
ters with her that she thought of when passing 
Melia’s shop ; a newspaper for Heffeman and a bit 
of tobacco, and a sugar-stick for the child. And 
she was thinking the way long till she’d get home 
to little Brigid, when didn’t she bob up against 
some one in the dark; and who was it only Dan. 

“What’s bringing you off here, Dan?” said she, 
“instead of attending to the business at home; 
is there anything wrong . . . ?” 

Dan didn’t know how to begin to tell her. 

“It was ... it was himself that bid me. . . . 
I was to make no delay for anything, only look 
for the child along the road . . . and sure, as like 
as not ...” 

“The child! is it Bridie? What do you mean? 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 345 

Sure there’s nothing after happening to her! 
Speak up, why don’t ye!” 

“Sure isn’t that what I’m trying . . . but she 
can’t be far, nor hadn’t time to be really lost . . . 
well, well!” as Marg rushed away from him, 
“why wouldn’t she listen, and not go flying off 
that-a-way like a mad-woman!” 

Mad! Well that’s what Marg really was, and 
she racing along like the wind, with a short hold 
of her skirts, and flinging her cloak and parcels 
from her, hither and over, as she ran! What did 
she care about them, about anything now? There 
was only room in her mind for the one thought: 
little B rigid was gone. 

Gone! Lost! and what is there that can 
happen, able to make you feel more astray and 
lonesome, than to lose anything, even if it’s only 
a button off your shirt? But of all things, to lose 
a child! All the dreadful things that ever you 
heard come into your mind, and you make up 
your mind that they’re all happening to that one 
child! Cold, you think, and hungry; worst of all, 
tired and frightened, and crying out for you to 
save it! 

And then you wonder what at all made it go off ! 
Did you speak sharp to it, or give it a little slap, 


34 6 The Folk of Furry Farm 

so that the child had gone off fretting and sore- 
hearted; and never to come back in life again? 

All these things, and more, passed through 
Marg’s mind, as she was tearing along the dark, 
silent road. She kept saying to herself, with a 
kind of sob, '‘What at all am I to do? Where 
should she be? To stray off, in the night and 
cold . . . sure she’ll get her death! What was 
Dark Moll about, that she couldn’t do that much, 
and she with nothing else to think of . . . and 
how well it should be my poor little laneen that 
wandered away ! how well the Grennans can 
have all theirs with them, safe and warm, this 
night, and my one little pet to be lost . . . lost! 
I had little to do, to go leave the house at all, for 
any Fairy Doctor! Sure, if I had stopped where 
I was, the pain might be gone by this! And the 
little child . . . and she so small . . . God and 
His Holy Angels watch over her, this night, 
I pray!” 

And along with these ideas there came into 
Marg’s mind the thought that when she’d get 
back to the house, there would be Heffeman, 
sitting by the fire, smoking, maybe, and maybe 
taking a sleep in his chair as he had the fashion 
of doing, easy and snug, and not casting a thought 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 347 

on little Brigid. He never did appear to take 
much notice of the child. And Marg felt now 
that she couldn’t stand that; it would make her 
hate the very sight of Heffeman. To think he’d 
be there, just as usual, warm and comfortable, 
and he near the close of his days, and her young 
little darling that was only beginning to live, 
gone from her! 

She was wild when she got to the door, and out of 
breath, so that she had to stand a minute before 
she could raise the latch. And as she was shaking 
at it, trembling all over, heart, soul, and body, 
behold ye! what did she hear, only some one 
singing inside in the kitchen ! Singing, of all 
things! And a queer old cracked voice it was, 
too, that was crooning out: 

“There was a frog lived in a well, 

Sing song, Kitty Katty Kimo.” 

“The Lord save us! that must be Mickey I 
hear! that never lifted a lip to sing in his mortial 
life before! Gone mad on me he must be, along 
with all other misfortunes! But sure, what odds 
about that or anything else, now!” thinks Marg to 
herself. 

And at last she got the door open, and then she 


34 8 The Folk of Furry Farm 

nearly fell into the kitchen, being giddy as well as 
tired, not to speak of the fret that was on her. 

What did she see then, by the light of a fine 
turf fire, only himself was sitting there, Mickey, in 
his own comer, where she imagined him as she was 
running home. But what she never thought to 
see, he had little Bride upon his knee, rocking 
and dandling her, as handy as you please. Marg 
could scarce believe her eyes. She stood there, 
trying to get her breath, and looking at the two 
there before her; and then she said, “She's not 
lost, then; thank God for all!” 

And still she made no attempt to interfere with 
Mickey; she never did; though now you could 
know by her that she was wild for the feel of her 
heart's treasure, her cushla machree, in her own 
arms. 

The child opened her eyes, and looked up dream- 
ing-like at Marg; then slumbered off again, with 
her rosy cheek and the tumbled bush of yel- 
low hair croodled up against Mickey’s old frieze 
coat, the same as a lamb with a ewe. And all 
the wisdom of the world couldn't have shown her 
better. 

A little slow blush crept up over poor Mickey’s 
face. It was the first time ever he balanced a 


Comrade Children at Furry Farm 349 

child upon his knee, and he was doing it the best, 
though awkward-appearing, with the child’s legs 
and one small little arm hanging helpless, and her 
frock every way upon her. But he thought he was 
great to have Brigeen hushoed off to sleep. 4 ‘See 
that, now,” says he, “sure a child is aisy minded, 
if only you go about it right. Ay, and knewn 
where to go look for her, too, what noan of yous 
knew, above on the Hill of the Rath. ...” 

“You! you! was it yourself done that? and 
took that great imminse climb.” The tears be- 
gan to rain down Marg’s face; a seldom thing to 
be seen. She went over to Heffeman and stooped 
down to kiss him. 

“Aisy, aisy now,” says he; “if you’re not care- 
ful, you’ll have the child awake!” 


THE END 















% 



Carmen and Mr. 
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By Humfrey Jordan 

Author of “The Joyous Wayfarer,” “Patchwork 
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Carmen has smouldering in the depths of 
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Horace Blake 

By 

Mrs. Wilfrid Ward 

Author of "Great Possessions 99 
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The World, London. 

G. P. Putnam’s Sons 

New York London 






































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